SELIO WINS FIRST PART OF CHAMPIONSHIP DREAM WITH POLE!
CAPPELLINI'S 2ND PUTS TITLE WITHIN REACH...IF!

SHARJAH, United Arab Emirates - 13th of December, 2007 – Finland's Sami Selio put himself in position to win his 2nd straight victory within a week while hoping Italian rival Guido Cappellini continues his bad luck in recent years here in order to capture his first title at tomorrow's 8th Annual Grand Prix of Sharjah, the 8th and final round of the 2007 U.I.M. F1 World Championship for power racing.

The 9 year veteran of the F1 Team Energy outdualed Cappellini with a 50.08 second flyer which was ½ second faster than the Como driver in the late afternoon “shootout” that featured the six quickest drivers in the previous two qualifying sessions as each driver came out one at a time to see if they could set the fast lap and gain pole position for tomorrow's Grand Prix.

“We have carried over our hard work from a week ago and I feel I am now riding a wave of success that I can take to tomorrow's final day of the season and do all I can to capture the title,” said Sami. “I have to take care of business from my end and then hope that Guido has a problem. That's all I can do.”

The 9-time World Champion Cappellini, has won twice in Sharjah in 2001 and 2005 with both times capturing a world title. However, the 48 year-old has hit a bit of a bad patch while only finishing one of the last four events here and losing last year to Scott Gillman of Los Angeles, California in a heart breaking dual for the title.

Starting 3rd will be rejuvinated driver Massimo Roggiero of the Woodstock Racing Team who has just returned to racing a week ago qualifying 6th in the race in Abu Dhabi before going out early with a mechanical problem and finishing 18th place. He would love to make it a BABA one-two since he built both his and pole sitter Selio's machine.

Swedish driver Jonas Andersson will start 4th for the third time this season chasing his 3rd podium finish and his first ever victory since coming over from the F2 championship a year ago.

Starting 5th will be Australian David Trask of the XPV Racing effort with a time of 51.50 reaching the “shootout” for the 3rd time this season and his second straight in the Emirates.

Sixth will be Jay Price of the Qatar Team a day after celebrating his birthday and doing a 52.11 second lap in his BABA boat and the sixth time in 8 races this season for the native from New Orleans, Louisiana to reach the shootout in his hopes of reaching a top-5 championship finish at days end tomorrow.

Thani Al Qamzi had all the hopes of the hometown fans on his shoulders coming into the event as last years quickest qualifier could only do a 52.80 and miss the top-6 by 1/100th of a second and will start 7th for the defending race champion.

French driver Philippe Chiappe was 8th quickest in his BABA boat as the Atlantic Team driver did a 53.14. Russian Stanislav Kourtsenovsky was 9th for the F1 Team Energy with a 53.18 second lap for the driver from St. Petersburg.

Rounding out the top-10  is Emirates Team number two driver Ahmed Al Hamli who did a 53.28 second lap for the Abu Dhabi driver.

The day brought a lot of excitement early on when driver Thani Al Qamzi and Italian Marco Gambi got together down in the 2nd of two right hand turns on the 2.33 kilometer course. Al Qamzi was forced to change boats and thus teammate Majeed Al Mansoori will miss the event.
Later in the morning practice session Chinese driver Peng Lin Wu got crossed up with Swedish driver Pierre Lundin down in the very fast first corner at the end of the straight in front of the pits as boats decelerate from 225 kilometers into a 135 degree turn. Both boats were destroyed when both barrel rolled over each other to a stop. The Chinese driver will miss the event while Ludin, 4th in the championship received his teammate Fabio Comparato's hull and will start back in the 21st position.

So, 22 drivers from 12 different countries will start tomorrow's final round of the 2007 U.I.M. F1 World Championship for power boating. The Grand Prix of Sharjah will feature the dreams of two drivers Sami Selio and Guido Cappellini in a dual in the sun for the 2007 title. Race time for the 8th race of the season will begin at 15:45 local and 11:45 GMT and 6:45 AM EST in North America.

Followers of the series will be able to follow the race with the exclusive use of the “live” lap by lap coverage by going to www.f1boat.com.

For additional information, interviews or video footage please contact:

Steve Michael Reporting - Philippe Stiernon F1 Press Officer

Photos: http://www.f1boatphotos.com