Just like last year, the OffShore Rib Rally 785 will have a stand at the HISWA RAI. The Rib Rally can be found in hall 6, right at the entrance and next to Yamaha Motor! The HISWA opens its doors at Tuesday the 2nd of March at 10.00. On Sunday the 7th the Rai will close its doors again at 18.00. Feel free to come by our stand and have a chat and a drink with one of our representatives! For more information about the HISWA go to http://www.hiswarai.nl

Some items you don’t want to miss:

Your last change for the pre-subscription benefits!
If you subscribe and make the downpayment before the first of March, an extra discount on the basic fee is given, and you will be able to put all your Rib Rally gear in your boat professionally with the free OverBoard Rib Rally Package!

Venue Hotels are open for reservation!
The hotels for all the Rib Rally European Tour Venues are know and reserved for you guys! Make sure you get your room directly, as we can offer you a better Rib Rally Price! Some of the hotels have a limited availability, so please be quick and make sure you are on the right scene!

Rib Rally @ the Hiswa
On Tuesday the 2nd of March, the Hiswa Boat Show starts again at the Rai. Rib Rally will be present, so please come by for a chat and drink at our stand, right next to the Yamaha Motor stand.

Rib Rally Merchandise to collect
It is time to get the coolest and handiest Rib Rally Merchandise! Our special jackets, waterproof gear and much more is for sale now at the Rib Rally. Looking good, rallying professional and feel the Rib Rally every where you go!

Download the complete Extra February Newletter here!

 Become part of the Rib Rally and support the Charity RIB

The Charity RIB will join in all five events in the European Tour 2010 and will certainly stand out between all other RIBs! The celebrity team driving the RIB will vary throughout the season and will try to compete in the top of the pack as much as possible. However, the RIB participates for Charity and not for victory! The RIB is divided into multiple “sponsorboxes” in which a company’s name can be placed. Together these boxes form a finish-flag making the RIB a striking appearance!

Creating opportunities and moments of happyness for the children

The revenues of the Charity RIB will be donated to two charities that both fight to give children around the world a better life; Right to Play and Stichting Opkikker. Right to Play is an International organization which puts their effort in developing sports and playing facilities for children around the world, thus improving the quality of their lives. Stichting Opkikker ofers children with a long disease the chance to have “the best day of their life”. They organize special days called Opkikker dagen for children and their parents top put their mind on something fun and forget about their disease for a while. A couple of times a year Stichting Opkikker organizes the Super Opkikker Dagen. They days offer approxmitely 50 families an experience they’ll never forget!

If you would like to sponsor the Charity RIB or require more information about the RIB, please contact us right away through e-mail on bertjan@ribrally.com, or by phone on +31 (0)344-621 343! If you would like to subscribe directly for the Charity RIB, please download the Charity RIB form in English or Dutch right away and return it by fax to +31 (0)344-621 182 or by email to bertjan@ribrally.com.

For 2010 the ranking system has been slightly altered. The amount of points to be gathered has been changed, as well as the way they are added iup to a grand total. Now, there also is a set number of points that can be earned per stage.

Charity RIB

In this year’s European Tour a special RIB will join the rallies; the Charity RIB. This RIB will be piloted by a team of Dutch celebrities. The tube will be covered with a special sticker set, a finish flag, which makes the RIB stand out of the others. All revenues from the Charity RIB will be donated to Right to Play and Stichting Opkikker.

Find out all about it in our February Newsletter!

Tech track:

Jetski Relay:

The tech track

At 14,45 Sijbrand called all the teams together for the second stage of the day; the technical track. In sets of two the teams had to complete the tech track twice. The starting order was the overall ranking so Polar Europe and Heesen/Valk started as first. Heesen/Valk rounded the track steadily and crossed the finish with a total time of 1:14. Polar Europe made a small mistake in their first run which cost them a lot of speed and about 5 seconds. They performed much better during their second run and finished with a total time of 1.21. Next up were Omnivents and GILS/M&M Bouw. After the first turn during the first run the run had to be restarted. The boats came at the crossing point at the same time and to avoid a collision GILS turned right, away from the course. In the rerun they came close to each other as well but this time the distance between the boats was enough to safely continue the track. GILS was incredibly fast during both of their runs and they crossed the finish in with a total time of 1:06! The next run was between Don Mario and Team GB. After having lost one member in the stage towards the island, Team GB made a great recovery and did very well during the technical course. They beat Don Mario with a difference of 2 seconds in each run. Their time was 1:17. The final run was between the Jaquet Ladies and a crew team. It was clear that the technical track was not really the ladies’ cup of tea. They finished with a total time of 1:35. 

The jetski relay

The final stage of the day was the jetski relay. Before we started, one team was the absolute favorite for the victory. GILS/M&M Bouw’s Tom and Max are both top jetskiers who compete in various international championships. They showed why they were favorites and won the relay with a big lead over the other teams. The battle for second place was a lot more intense! After completing four full laps, the difference between Polar Europe and Heesen/Valk was only 0.01 second! This was the smallest difference in Rib Rally history.

A night convoy

After all the stages we stayed at Klein Curacao for dinner and a campfire. The prize giving ceremony was held at the campfire and afterwards we prepared the boats for a night convoy. With the sea being lit by a spectacular moon, it was a perfect ending to a really perfect day!

RIB Stage:

The teams started with their runners at the Cabana beach. Two teams started simultaneously. The teams in last place started with the stage. The course went into the resort and to the second swimming pool on the right hand side. Here they had to jump in and swim or walk to the centre of the pool to pick up the bucket with sand. From there they had to run back to the beach and pass their bucket over to the swimmer. With one hand in the air, he had to get to a pontoon as quickly as possible. From there the bucket was passed over to the rowers who had to row from the pontoon, around a buoy to finish line at the beach.

Since we have an uneven number of teams in this year’s Rib Rally, a team made out of crew members took part in this stage. They were the opponents of the team in last place; Jaquet Ladies. The team consisted of Guus Stalenhoef (rower), Branco de Lange (rower), Nick Visser (swimmer) and Thomas van Dam (runner). At exactly 11.00 the endurance stage started. First up were the crew team and Jaquet Ladies. The crew team’s time was not measured since it did not count anyway. They were only there to give Jaquet Ladies the same opposition as everyone else. Jaquet Ladies managed to finish the course in just under 6 minutes. Hwoever, they did not lose any sand during the stage! Next up were Don Mario and Team GB. They made it into a very close race and the difference at the finish line was only 1 second! Team Don Mario did take care of their sand a little better, they lost 3 cm where Team GB lost 4,5 cm. After Don Mario and Team GB it was GILS/M&M Bouw and Omnivents’ turn. At the pontoon, GILS/M&M Bouw had a nice lead over Omnivents. At the pontoon it went wrong for both teams. Their member who had to collect the sand bucket and get in the boat slipped, he almost dropped the bucket and fell into the water himself. Unfortunately for Omnivents it did not go smoothly for them either. Their team member did not only slip, but also managed to jump next to the boat instead in into it. Because of this he had to swim a bit to collect the boat en get in. In the end GILS/M&M Bouw won the heads up race with a lead of 11 seconds over Omnivents. Omnivents was allowed to start the RIB stage in a better position than GILS/M&M Bouw though. Omnivents completed the course with all the sand left in the bucket where GILS/M&M Bouw had lost 1 cm of sand. Last but certainly not least was the heads up race between Polar Europe and Heesen/Valk. They both showed why they are the teams in the lead! They both finished the race over 30 seconds faster than the team in third position! Polar Europe gave everything when they where rowing and beat Heesen/Valk with 13 seconds. They did that without losing any sand during the way! For Heesen/Valk it got almost impossible to win the race when one of their paddles broke in two pieces just as they set off from the pontoon. This incident also caused them to accidentally kick over their bucket of sand. In the end they had lost 6 cm of sand and were confined to starting in last place during the RIB stage.

After the endurance stage, everyone had a few hours of time for themselves. Most teams spent this time to relax, swim, get a massage or complain about their performance during the endurance stage.

At 14.00 everyone was ready for the RIB stage. The course went from Kontiki, around Klein Curacao and back to Kontiki. Rally Director Bert-Jan called the local airport to check the up to date weather conditions. Unfortunately winds where in excess of 25 knots and the rally management decided it was too rough to rally. They made a well considered decision to take change the rally course. Instead of going around Klein Curacao, the course now went along the coast of Curacao with waypoints at the tip towards Klein Curacao and just above Kralendijk.

At 14.00 hrs the boats went out of the harbor and onto the sea. Team Don Mario had a little change. Due to medical reason Peter van Halder was unable to continue the rally and Naud Hunink took his place in the back of boat number 5. Before the start we gave away a little show on the waves. The teams were free to show off their skills to the crowds and cameras that were present. After about 10 minutes everyone was called together to line up for the start. Everyone had so much fun playing around in the waves that they would almost forget that there was a rally stage waiting as well! Instead of a flying start, this stage started with a still start. The teams took off in 10 second intervals. The teams who were able to keep the most sand in their bucket could take off first. Since overall leaders Heesen/Valk had some trouble with their bucket in the rowing boat, they had lost a lot of sand and had to start in last place. Team Polar Europe on the other hand had arrived with a full bucket of sand and a very quick time which gave them the right to take off in first place! With the stopwatch in their hands, crew boat 1 gave the starting signals.

With exactly 10 seconds between them the teams set of for already the fourth rally of this year’s Caribbean Edition. Everyone knew they could expect big waves but from what we heard, some did not expect it to be this rough out there. The first stretch to WP1 was against the waves. This made the RIBs jump high out of the water and gave our photographers a good chance at some great shots! The teams all performed very well and because of this it was hard for teams to make up the seconds they had lost by starting further to the back of the field. Polar Europe was in a good flow. They made high jumps and soft landings. They were so calm and confident on board that they even started singing with the four of them. A team that did not really have their day was Team Omnivents. Willem fell overboard during the stage and made nasty contact with the A-Frame when he flew out. Luckily he was able to climb back on board and continue the stage. Since the impact was so big, he was not sure if he was going to be able to rally again on Thursday.

Team GB had a very different reason to stop in the middle of the rally. During the week our teams have “caught” about five flying fishes. There are a lot of these fish surrounding the islands and during a stage they fly away in front of the boat. However, instead of flying away from the boat, some fish land in the boat. Team GILS has had two fish on board already. Unfortunately for the fish, they usually don’t survive the trips on board of the RIBs. This did not happen to the fish that jumped on board of Team GB’s boat. Being afraid of bad karma they stopped the boat, picked up the fish, and threw it overboard. Thanks to these guys, the fish is now still swimming and flying around Curacao.

After about 1 hour and some good rain, the first teams started to appear at the horizon. Only 10 to 20 meters above them there was a helicopter of the Coast Guard. It was following the rally and coming really close to the boats. This really made a spectacular sight!

When they approach crew 1, they were able to determine that the boat that was in the lead was Polar Europe. They had not given away their first place and even managed to extend their lead to the boat in second positions with about 30 seconds.  The second team to come in was Team GILS/M&M Bouw. They were able to overtake 2 teams during the stage and secure 113 points in their pursuit of the first place in the overall ranking.

Even with the rough seas out there all the teams performed very well during this stage. The difference between the first place and seventh place was just under 10 minutes!

At 10.45 we got all the teams together and went out to sea. Everyone had 10 minutes at the water to warm up their muscles and prepare for the rally. At 11.00 sharp the green flag went down again and everyone set of on their way to WP1. During this rally WP1 and WP6 were on the same location. These waypoints were the only ones without a crew boat present. Even though there was no crew boat, every team rounded these waypoints correctly.

When the boats passed WP5 after the first big lap, the British team in boat number 4 had a technical problem. They came to crew 1 and told them that they did not have a working VHF and GPS. They had been having this problem from WP1 on. They only knew where they were going because they could follow some of the other boats. Just as crew 1 was trying to come up with a quick solution, Team GB shouted that they had fixed the problem. It was a very minor problem. During the rally one of the team members accidentally hit the power switch and turned everything off. All they had to do to fix the problem was flip de switch. After a quick radio check to make sure everything was working fine again, they flew into the distance to chase the other boats.

The second Team GB left, another team came by. It was Don Mario in the number 5 boat. Instead of going to WP6, they went straight on into the harbour. After about 10 minutes they came back out again with only 2 people in the boat. Peter van Halder had hurt is back and was unable to continue the rest of the rally. To support him one of the other members got out of the boat as well. The team went on with the rally, not even knowing if it was allowed to continue with only 2 people on board.

The distance between the leading teams and the teams at the back had gotten so big that by the time Jaquet Ladies passed WP5, we already got the message that the boat in first place was on its way. With the binoculars we were able to see that the leading team was GILS Worldwide. They crossed the finish line with their arms in the air and shouting from joy. They had really showed that their first place from day 1, although they received a penalty later, was not just luck. They really are fast! At just over 2 minutes Polar Europe came flying past crew 1. Newcomers Omnivents came in about 6 minutes after Polar Europe and secured their second 3rd place!

After the rally our rally management got together and looked at how the rally stage went. They found irregularities at two teams. It turned out that both Don Mario and Team GB had missed WP8. They heard this from the crew who was at the waypoint and from the camera crew who managed to film the teams cutting a bit off the course. However, Don Mario made other mistakes during this stage as well. They did not have their GPS tracking system on so the crew could not see the exact route they had followed. Also they left two crew members at the pontoon in the harbour while only one was injured. These facts combined gave the rally management no other option then to disqualify team Don Mario. Team GB received a 5 minute penalty for missing the waypoint.