Last call for Athens

470 Worlds get underway in Zadar, Croatia next week

43 Nations will contest the last of the 2004 470 Class Olympic Qualification regattas starting this week at the S.C. Uskok, Zadar Croatia. With six Olympic slots still to be decided in the Men's division and five in the Women's, competition among the 140+ Teams will be hot from the start.

Sailors from around the World including eight teams from China and eleven from Japan will also be contesting their National Olympic Selections in Zadar. Qualifying rounds for the 34th Worlds Championship will run from 10-12 May with the finals on 13-16 May.

Many eye's will be on the dominant Women's Greek team of Sofia Bekatorou and Emilia Tsoulfa to see if they can secure their record breaking fifth World Championship in a row. This would certainly be a good omen for the Greek pair looking to 'grab gold' in their home country's Olympic Games come August.

Chasing Sofia and Milly, ISAF Sailors of the Year 2002, will be the French pair of Ingrid Petitjean and Nadege Douroux and the rapidly rising Russian Team of Vlada Ilienko and Natalia Gaponovich. Reigning Olympic Gold Medallists Jenny Armstrong and Belinda Stowell are due to run into some form and may have a hand in the final standing. While young veteran's Susanna and Michaela Ward are starting to regain speed after a break following the 2000 Olympics. Then there is the Spanish medallist Natalia Via Dufresne as well as Lisa Westeroff crewed by 1999 ISAF Sailor of the year and Olympic Medalist Margriet Matthijsse of the Nederlands.

In the Men's Championship, competition has never been tougher with 15 or more teams possible title winners. Just 10 points separated the top six places at the recent Princess Sofia regatta. Favourites must come from the Australian's Nathan Wilmot and Malcolm Page, number 1 in the ISAF Rankings, Johan Molund and Martin Andersson from Sweden (Winner of the two Pre-Olympic regattas) or Nick Rogers and Joe Glanfield (winners of the Princess Sofia) .

But one cannot count out the '96 Gold Medallists Eugeniy Braslavets and Igor Matviyenko of the Ukraine and boats from Argentina, Portugal, the Nederlands, Russia , Greece, France, the USA, Israel or the reigning World Champions Gabrio Zandona and Andrea Trani of Italy.

The Winner of the 2004 Worlds will deserve the ranking of "Favorite for the Gold" in Athens , but in both fleets the possiblities are numerous as to who the champions will be.

Men's line-up

ARG-61	Matias	Buhler	Marcos	Lamas
ARG-70	Javier	Conte	Juan	de la Fuente
AUS-311	Nathan	Wilmot	Malcolm	Page
AUS-347	Nathan	Outteridge	Ayden	Menzies
AUS-351	Mathew	Belcher	Behrens	Nick
AUT-3	Matthias	Schmid	Florian	Reichstaedter
BEL-1252	Bruno	Van Antwerpen	Pim	Peters
BRA-17	Alexandre	Paradeda	Bernardo	Arndt
BUL-191	Evgeniy	Mavrodiev	Yasen	Arnaudov
CAN-555	John	Russell	Brent	MacDonald
CAN-606	Stephane	Locas	Oliver	Bone
CAN-610	Craig	Noakes	Nick	Beaudoin
CHN-1	Jun	Qian	Weijun	Zhao
CHN-36	Wuzhi	Lin	Boxiong	Zhou
CHN-428	Feng	Zheng	Zhiqiang	Fu
CHN-431	Gongguo	Wang	Suhong	Wang
CHN-541	Guoxing	Wang	Yongdong	Zhang
CRO-17	Kresimir	Dakulovic	Luka	Dogan
CRO-19	Kresimir	Kunda	Ivan	Kunic
CRO-49	Toni	Bulaja	Sime	Stipanicev
CRO-6	Ante	Cesic	Ante	Kujundzic
CRO-60	Dan	Lovrovic	Damir	Nakrst
CRO-81	Matija	Longin	Pavle	Kostov
CRO-83	Sime	Fantela	Igor	Marceliic
CRO-98**	Karlo	Krpeljevic	Josko	Lalic
CRO-TBA	Tomislav	Basic	Petar	Cupac
CYP-244	Christos	Pashias	Paris	Athanasiou
CZE-5	Tomas	Musil	Jan	Danek
DEN-141	Kristian	Kjaergaard	Mads	Moeller
ESP - 17	Martinez Doreste	Gustavo	Wood	Dimas
ESP - 1733	Marc Patino	Marc	Juan Moreno	Omar
EST-11	Eerik	Luka	Taavi	Siilbek
FIN-139	Olli	Posti	Jukka	Saarikorpi
FRA 2574**	Ronan	Dreano	Ronan	Floch
FRA 2605	Vincent	Aillaud	David	Lechene
FRA 2623	Benjamin	Bonnaud	Romain	Bonnaud
FRA-2630	Gildas	Philippe	Nicolas	le Berre
FRA-TBA		Laboucher		Garos
GBR-812	Callum	MacDonald	Stuart	Bithell
GBR-814**	Neil	Marsden	Graham	Nelson
GBR-816	Nic	Asher	Elliot	Willis
GBR-818	Graham	Vials	Bevis	Field
GBR-TBC	Nick	Rogers	Joe	Glanfield
GER 4896	Robert	Remus	Ralf	Butzlaff
GER 4913	Martin	Metzing	Sascha	Eckelmann
GER 4923	Lukas	Zellmer	Felix	Krabbe
GRE 131	Andreas	Kostamatopoulos	Kostas	Trigonis
GRE 165	Panagiotis	Kambouridis	Aggelos	Lemanis
HUN-1	Marcell	Goszleth	Adom	Szorenii
HUN-131	Péter	Czégai	Mátyás	Majthenyi
HUN-162	Bence	Lovas	Peter	Farkas
HUN-335	Andras	Takacs	Peter	Takacs
HUN-391**	Gabor	Sallai	David	Olosz
HUN-71	Andras	D'Albini	Zsombor	Szepfy
IND 14	Sandip	Jain	Utpal	More
IND 7	Farokh	Tarapore	Vikas	Kapila
IRL-66	Gerald	Owens	Ross	Killian
ISR-7	Gideon	Kliger	Udi	Gal
ITA-1	Bianchi	Niccolo	Bianchi	Francesco
ITA-2	Zandonà	Gabrio	Trani	Andrea
ITA-4322	Buffa	Alessandro	Lalli	Luca
ITA-4332	Fonda	Enrico	Zucchetti	Pietro
JPN-3655	Sambu	Taisei	Takamura	Motoharu
JPN-3967	Matsunaga	Tetsuya	Makino	Yukio
JPN-4011	Kazuto	Seki	Kenjiro	Todoroki
JPN-4100	Hideki	Yoshimine	Akihito	Nakamura
JPN-4150	Kimitoshi	Nakamura	Kan	Yamada
JPN4154	Akira	Ishibashi	Hiroki	Goto
KOR-77	Kyu-tae	Park	Chang-il	Sung
KOR81**	Daeyoung	Kim	Sungahun	Jung
KOR88**	Cheul	Yoon	Hyoengtae	Kim
LAT-777	Matiss	Alvikis	Robert	Danchauskis
NED-1	Sven	Coster	kalle	Coster
NED-5	Coen	de Koning	Wilco	Stavenuiter
NED-8	Bart	Peeters	Olivier	Bakker
NZL-197	Stephen	Keen	Philip	Keen
NZL-199	Andrew	Brown	Jamie	Hunt
POL 5	Tomasz	Stanczyk	Tomasz	Jakubiak
POL 50	Patryk	Piasecki	Jacek	Przybylak
POL 7134	Rafal	Sawicki	Pawel	Nowakowski
POR 22	Alvaro	Marinho	Miguel	Nunes
ROM-101	Paul	Negoescu	Tiberiu	Simionescu
RUS 11	Pavel	Kalinchev	Alexander	Zybin
RUS 2	Mikhail	Sheremetiev	Roman	Gorev
RUS 8	Dmitri	Berezkin	Mikhail	Krutikov
SIN 677	Tay	Roy Junhao	Chung	Peiming
SLO 149	Tomaz	Copi	Davor	Glavina
SLO 16	Karlo	Hmeljak	Mitja	Nevecny
SLO -18	Luka	Krizman	Crt	Kovac
SLO -34	Saso	Jurak	Rian	Pilepic
SLO 798**	Simon	Dekleva	Vid	Jeranko
SUI 3	Lukas	Erni	Simon	Brügger
SUI-51	Tobias	Etter	Felix	Steiger
SWE-317	Johan	Molund	Martin	Andersson
TUR-105	Peynri	Levent	Okan	Akdag
TUR-2	Selim	Kakis	Ozgoneng	Kaak
UKR 10	Yitaliy	Moshkovskiy	Andrij	Shafraniyk
UKR 7	Yevgen	Braslavets	Igor	Matvienko
USA-1713	Stuart	McNay	Arthur	Kinsolving
USA-1722	Paul	Foerster	Kevin	Burnham
YUG 85	Igor	Ivanchir	Dejan	Antic

Women's line-up

ARG-104	Fernanda	Sesto	Paula	Reinoso
AUS-341	Jenny	Armstrong	Belinda	Stowell
AUS-346	Elise	Rechichi	Rike	Ziegelmayer
AUT431	Sylvia	Vogl	Carolina	Flatscher
BRA-177	Fernanda	Oliveira	Adriana	Kostiw
CAN-520	Provan	Jennifer	Nikola	Girke
CHN-15	Xiaqun	Song	Yan	Wang
CHN-25	Yimei	Wen	Chunyan	Yu
CHN-282	Cuixian	Lian	Lizhen	Wu
CRO100	Jasna	Supuk	Nevenka	Cuk
DEN-127	Susanne	Ward	Michaela	Ward
ESP - 1788	Via Dufresne	Natalia	Azon	Sandra
EST-9	Maria	Veessaar	Maiki	Saaring
FIN 1	Maria	Saarikallio	Maria	Diesen
FRA2594	Ingrid	Petitjean	Nadège	Douroux
FRA-TBA		Adam		Adam
FRA-TBA		Harmart		Theron
GBR-813	Christina	Bassadone	Katherine	hopson
GER 4863	Sabine	Walter	Antje	Struckat
GER 4911	Alina	Grobe	Vivien	Kussatz
GER 4921	Kathrin	Kadelbach	Saskia	Schröder
GER 4928	Stefanie	Rothweiler	Monika	Leu
GRE 64	Sofia	Bekatorou	Emilia	Tsoulfa
HUN-49	Marta	Weores	Anna	Payr
HUN-622	Kata	Varadi	Julianna	Varadi
ISR 10	Nike	Kornecki	Vered	Bouskila
ITA 4334	Saccheggiani	Elisabetta	Cutolo	Myriam
ITA-4321	Pignolo	Giulia	Grio	Nicole
JPN-4088	Chizuko	Ijima	Makiko	Ikuta
JPN-4106	Reiko	Takahashi	Naoko	Kamata
JPN-4107	Yuka	Yoshisako	Mitsuko	Satake
JPN-4151	Ai	Ai Kondo	Yuki	Kanai Yuki
JPN-4170	Wakako	Tabata	Naomi	Kurita
NED 11	Marcelien	De Koning	Lobke	Berkhout
NED 6	Lisa	Westerhof	Margriet	Matthijsse
NED-10	Marjon	Kooistra	Petra	De Goederen
NZL 200	Melinda	Henshaw	Jan	Shearer
NZL-195	Shelley	Hesson	Linda	Dickson
POL 517	Marta	Petrasz	Gabriela	Brzoska
POL 55	Katarzyna	Tylinska	Zuzanna	Gladysz
ROM-100	Iulia	Negoescu	Raluca	Plugaru
RUS 16**	Regina	Zakirova	Marina	Ermakova
RUS 700	Vladelina	Ilienko	Natalia	Gaponovich
SIN- 11	Toh	Liying	Tok	Leeching
SLO 142	Vesna	Dekleva	Klara	Maucec
SLO 19	Janja	Orel	Alenka	Orel
SUI-4	Franziska	Duerig	Monika	Meier
SWE-314	Karin	Almquist	Teresa	Enander
SWE-321	Therese	Torgersson	Vendela	Zachrisson
TUR-58	Begum	Gongor	Yilmazer	Pinar
UKR 7	Angelina	Kalincheva	Natalia	Zaverukha
USA-1732	Katherine	McDowell	Isabelle	Kinsolving