Hungarian Crew Crowned Soling World Champions For The Second Time

On the 50th Anniversary of the Soling World Championship in Castiglione, Italy the Hungarian crew of Litkey Farkas, Karoly Vezer and Csaba Weinhardt took home the title despite a long and drawn out protest hearing.

Although the protest did not directly involve the Hungarian crew they still had to wait for a jury decision, and a possible reopening, over an incident in race 6 involving Brazil, Argentina and Canada. The result was a disqualification for Canada that confirmed Hungary as champions for the second time, their first coming just two years ago in the 2013 edition.

The last day of racing saw the unpredictable winds of previous days continue but PRO Carlo Tosi was able to get the fleet off and away. But as the winds started to turn Team Ramadabalaton with veteran George Wossala, Peter Nemeth and Christoph Joo pulled ahead to win with Canada’s Billy, Joanne and William Abbott in second and Ukraine’s Igor Yushko, Sergey Pihuguin and Ivansits Sergej third.

The final standings showed the strong competition from every continent with six different nations filling the top six spots with Hungary, Canada, Austria, Germany, Ukraine and Brazil in first to sixth respectively.

There were a host of trophies handed out at the end of competition including the Tony Clare Trophy awarded to Canada’s Billy, Joanne and William Abbott for a second placed finish. Austria’s Michael and Florian Felzmann finished in third, with Florian also taking the Paul Elvstrom Trophy for helmsman age 28 and under.

The German team of Karl Haist, Martin Zeileis and Simon Haist finished in fourth and were awarded the Grand Master Bowl, the team from the Netherlands of Han and Torn van Veen and Ben Boogaerd won the KC1 Classic Trophy and the best placed South American team, and winners of the Lucio Glomb Trophy belonged to Brazil’s Nelson, Gustavo and Felipe Ilha.

The last award was the Vittorio Porta Trophy which on this occasion was given to Stuart Walker who finished very well in the middle of the field at the age of 94.

The next World Championships will be held in Kingston, Canada in September 2016 but the 50th year anniversary celebrations continue at the European Championships taking place in Berlin in September of this year.

Results