Extreme Sailing Series, Gazprom Team Russia to compete in the series

London – Extreme Sailing Series organisers OC Sport, have today confirmed the eleventh team on the starting grid for the 2014 Stadium Racing tour as the first ever Russian Extreme 40 team. The team will make their debut alongside some of the world’s best known sailing teams and sailors including Groupama Team France, Emirates Team New Zealand, The Wave, Muscat and J.P. Morgan BAR. The 2014 Notice of Race allows up to 10 full teams with two wildcards at OC Sport discretion. With the Russians now in, plus several of the single event wildcards already confirmed, including Team Aberdeen Singapore for Act 1, the grid is pretty well full for the year.

Two of Russia’s top sailors will get their introduction to the world of elite level multihull racing, including 25-year-old London 2012 and Beijing 2008 Olympic Laser sailor and Russian national champion Igor Lisovenko. Lisovenko, who will skipper the team, commented: “This is both a challenge and an opportunity for me to become skipper and tactician of such a team, that for the first time will fly the Russian flag in such a highly competitive fleet. I wish to prepare and perform well for when we arrive at the Saint Petersburg event in June! But the level of the team members assures me that even the highest expectations are within our potential.”

The teams bowman will be Aleksei Kulakov, a highly experienced dinghy sailor and one of Russia’s top 49er sailors, who has competed with the Synergy Russian Sailing Team in the RC44 class.

Gazprom Team Russia have drafted some of the Extreme Sailing Series’ most successful sailors, including Britain’s Paul Campbell-James, who steered The Wave, Muscat and then Luna Rossa to victories in the 2010 and 2011 Series respectively, as their helm. Campbell-James will step back on to an Extreme 40 where he left off, in Singapore, where he won the final Act of the year in 2011, and is itching to get back in the driving seat. “I don’t think anyone goes into it (the Extreme Sailing Series), not hoping they are going to win. The reality is that we’ll be a little bit on the back foot from event one having never seen the boat we are going to sail. I’m just so looking forward to going back out there racing and having 12 even boats. The Extreme 40s is always amazingly good fun. There is nowhere else in the world where you do eight races average and occasionally as many as 12. I can’t wait to go out there and start duking it out on what is undoubtedly going to be the best circuit in sailing.”

Alister Richardson, who has been part of two winning Series teams, before joining Luna Rossa’s challenge for the 34th America’s Cup, will be the team’s mainsail trimmer. And Pete Cumming, who was the 2009 Extreme Sailing Series winning skipper, and formally trimmer with the SAP Extreme Sailing Team, has been recruited as the teams’ headsail trimmer in the mid-season transfer window. SAP Extreme Sailing Team will reveal their team line-up on Thursday 30th January.

12 teams will line-up for Act 1 in Singapore, including the local wildcard entry, Team Aberdeen Singapore, bringing together some of the world’s top sailing talent, from across all major disciplines of the sport. Once again, the racing will be available to watch live on the official Series website, www.extremesailingseries.com, bringing fans all the racing action as it happens.

Crew list:
Skipper/Tactician: Igor Lisovenko (RUS)
Helmsman: Paul Campbell-James (GBR)
Mainsail trimmer: Alister Richardson (GBR)
Headsail trimmer: Peter Cumming (GBR)
Bowman: Aleksei Kulakov (RUS)

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