[Lars Linger is back and training ahead of Marstrand]

(2002-06-27, Stockholm/Marstrand) Lars Linger is training match racing ahead of the Swedish Match Cup.
It will be his first sailing competition for a very long time. He is now completely recovered from the serious injury he suffered while training on Örn in the Hauraki Gulf, Auckland, in the beginning of May.
"It good to start sailing again", says Lars Linger, genoa trimmer for the Swedish America's Cup challenge and part of helmsman Magnus Holmberg's crew for the final event in the Swedish Match Tour in Marstrand next week.

The accident happened on May 7. An unloader came loose on Örn (SWE 63), hitting him in the back causing fractures but he was still lucky.
"I could be sitting in a wheelchair today, or even worse", he says. If the unloader had hit two centimetres more to the right, it would have fractured his spine. The fractures he now received have healed. "I'm not feeling any back problems now".

Lars Linger, like Stefan Rahm, Magnus Augustson and Mikkel Røssberg, is part of Magnus Holmberg's match racing team that won the Swedish Match Tour overall last year and are in second place ahead of the Marstrand event starting on Monday. The second Victory Challenge team in the competition is Jesper Bank's. He has his normal crew of Thomas Jacobsen, Henrik Valderyd, Morten Halkier and Henrik Blakskjær with him.

They were training three days last week at the Trekant area's Match Race Center in Middelfart on the Danish island of Funen. They've been training in Marstrand, where preparations are in full swing for the Swedish Match Cup, yesterday and today. This is more training preparation than they've ever had ahead of a Swedish Match Tour event since they joined Victory Challenge.

[Lars Linger with stiff neck - and is massaged by Magnus Augustson during a break]

Focus has been on preparations ahead of the America's Cup, which starts with the Louis Vuitton Cup on October 1. But, just now, the Victory Challenge crew is home in Sweden to put the final touches to Orm (SWE 73) and some holiday - and so it was possible to schedule the two training camps.

Lars Linger has been home in Sweden for rehab since shortly after he left the Auckland hospital in mid-May. He tested sailing again for the first time the Sunday before the trip to Denmark. After that, he gave the OK to his teammates.
"But my muscles were given a shock by the accident, so I get tired when I sail. I've got a stiff neck too, but it doesn't give me any problems. I feel really charged."

This means that he is well prepared to return to Victory Challenge and the final preparations ahead of the America's Cup. Some of the crew will already be returning to Auckland next week and the rest after the Marstrand event.

The format for this year's Swedish Match Cup has been changed since last year. Magnus Holmberg, Lars Linger and their team are among the top six seeds and go straight in at the quarterfinal stage starting next Thursday.

For Jesper Bank and his team, the competition will be starting already on Monday with the first round robin stage. They are among the ten teams battling for the remaining places in the quarterfinals.

Bert Willborg/Victory Challenge