Nipper joins brother on Ericsson in media role

Gurnard well represented on Grael skippered VOR boat

The two crews of the Ericsson Racing Team last Friday completed their 3,000-nautical-mile voyage from Sweden to the training base in the Canary Islands.

The voyage officially qualified Ericsson 3 and Ericsson 4 for the upcoming Volvo Ocean Race, of which a 2,000-nautical-mile voyage is required. The 37,000-nautical-mile circumnavigation race is scheduled to start Oct. 11 in Alicante, Spain.

With the qualification complete, the team has turned to the final preparation phase of its pre-race activities. It will spend the next six weeks at its training camp at the Puerto Calero Marina on Lanzarote tuning and working on its two Juan Kouyoumdjian designs.

"It is great that we now have both boats qualified for the Volvo Ocean Race," said Richard Brisius, Ericsson Racing Team Managing Director. "Both crews were pretty happy with the performance of the boats, and the team will now spend the remaining weeks finalizing preparations within all areas of the team."

The eight-day passage was the first sail for the new Ericsson 4, which was launched on June 26. Ericsson 3, launched in January, has been sailing at the base since March.

The delivery to the Canary Islands proved to be a good shakedown for the race when both crews faced a strong front in the North Sea that produced big waves and strong winds. The crews also battled fog, strong tides and light winds in the passage, allowing them to test how the boats perform across a wide spectrum.

"It was pretty good for us and we were in all types of conditions so we were able to push the boat for the first time," said Torben Grael, the Brazilian skipper of Ericsson's International crew. "Weather-wise we had a bit of everything, we were lucky to get through before the front in the North Sea and after that the Bay of Biscay was good, despite the strong winds."

Anders Lewander, the Swedish skipper of Ericsson's Nordic crew, led his crew on a 6,000-mile passage. They delivered Ericsson 3 from Lanzarote to Sweden in late June as a means to strengthen their offshore experience as well as test Ericsson 3 in more offshore conditions.

"It's been a superb reality check both day and night with a good mix of conditions," said Lewander. "This is the first and last time we'll be able to do a trip in this way, and we are very fortunate to be able to fit this into the program. It feels good to have qualified for the Volvo Ocean Race, and while we have some work to do I'm real happy with the boat's and crew's performance."

Ericsson Racing Team is pleased to announce that Guy (Nipper) Salter of Great Britain will be the media crewmember for Grael's International crew. The media crewmember is a new feature of the Volvo Race, with each boat required to carry one crewmember whose time is devoted to chronicling life aboard a Volvo Open 70 and relaying all the information - text, pictures, audio and video - to the race office while at sea.

"It's good to have filled the role, especially with such a good sailor as Guy, who also has great media skills," said Grael. "Guy has a good relationship with all of the crew and I think that this going to work very well - both for us as a team and the race as a whole."

Salter, 36, is a previous Volvo Ocean Race participant and brother of Jules Salter, the navigator for Grael's crew. Due to his experience, Guy Salter, who has a degree in film and photography, understands the task ahead of him.

"I think it going to be tough, but here I am doing it again," Guy Salter said. "The media job is going to be interesting, but it is not necessarily going to be easy."

With the sporting side of the campaign on schedule, the management of Ericsson Racing Team is satisfied that Sales & Marketing and Communications preparations also are on schedule.

In each stopover selected customers are being invited to tailor-made programs, including seminars and technology demonstrations in the state-of-art Ericsson Pavilion. The pavilion will host thousands of visitors at meetings currently scheduled across the stopovers.

An internal communication program targeting Ericsson's 77,000 employees is being activated, as well as an external communication program.

"The Ericsson Market Units, especially the stopover markets, have been very proactive in ensuring that they take full advantage of this event at each of the stopover ports," Brisius said. "The experience from our participation in the previous race has been invaluable when planning for this coming one."

For more information see: http://www.ericssonracingteam.com