On June 6 and 7 the Russian Open was held in St.Petersburg - the International endurance race on RIB boats with outboard engines "White Night Endurance". This extreme marathon is held for the third year running. Last year, 2001 the race was included into the calendar of the Union International Motonautice (UIM). In 2003 this competition is expected to receive the status of the World Championship. For detail information on the competition one can visit the site www.race24hours.ru.

As is known, last year the YAMARAN team on the boat YAMARAN™ A540R with the outboard engine YAMAHA F115AETL became the Champion of Russia in the PR1500 class and took the second place in the total absolute rating. For detail description of this race one can visit the site http://www.yamaran.com/news/11_08_01.htm .

According to the "White Night Endurance" race rules, only the commercial engines can be used without any design modifications and tuning. The 2002 race was held in four classes, the maximum displacement of the engines in which amounted to 700, 1000, 1500 and 2000 cm³, respectively. However, this year the organizers of the race introduced a 30% handicap referred to the respective classes of outboard engines meeting the EPA ecological standards. Thus, in the senior class PR-2000 it secured the opportunity to use the engines MERCURY OPTIMAX series and YAMAHA HPDI series, with displacement up to 2600 cm³. Having received information that the main competitor - "MERCURY NII TM" team plans to participate in the competition with the OPTIMAX engine, we decided to prepare the engine YAMAHA Z150 PETOL HPDI for the race. This is the six-cylinder engine with the displacement of 2596 cm³ equipped with direct high pressure fuel injection, which could adequately compete with the MERCURY 150 OPTIMAX engine with the displacement of 2507 cm³.

The other competitors of class PR2000 used mainly commercial V4 engines, of different trade marks, with horsepower rating of 130-140 h.p. The exception was the "AUTONAUTIQUE" team (Belgium-France) which used the sport engine MERCURY XR-2 whose characteristic roar unequivocally indicated that its origin was far from serial. To great surprise of the participants and guests of the competition the boat and engine of the "AUTONAUTIQUE" team passed the technical commission without hindrance and were admitted to take part in the competition. Let this remain on the organizers' conscience.

For this race our team used the boat YAMARAN™ B540R. This commercial boat of 540 cm long (over the float) and about 300 kg in weight differed from the last year boat A540R mainly by weight distribution which allowed weight compensation for a heavier engine and stabilization of the run of the boat on high waves. The majority of teams of the senior classes also used the commercial boats made by MNEV & K and STRINGER boat building companies, only the "MERCURY NII TM" and "AUTONAUTIQUE" teams prepared light sport boats for the competition.

In this race the YAMARAN-AQUATRADE team did not have its own sportsman - water race pilot. The only sportsman from the last year team - Alexander Smirnov - was absent for a "very reasonable" reason - he headed the "ELERON-YAMAHA" team which won the class PR-700 in the same race. On the eve of the World Championship the race organizers welcomed in every way the incorporation of foreign participants into the teams. So our team this year also acquired the international status - a citizen of Finland, Mika Kontunen - ardent enthusiast of extreme water motor attractions became one of the pilots of the team. Two pilots - Konstantin Dmitriev and Alexander Lvov represented AQUATRADE company www.aqua-trade.spb.ru , and other two pilots Dmitry Sandler and Andrey Gerastchenko - "PETROSET BOLSHOY" company www.petroset.ru .