With 3 days until start the foreign teams have started to arrive in Stockholm. There are 23 teams competing in this year’s edition and it is a fantastic fleet of sailors: 10 nationalities from Europe, Australia and the Americas. 6 mixed teams. 2 youth teams (both helm and crew are under 19).

There are a several contenders for the podium and the level of competition is as always on a high level. Some teams to watch out for:

• BEL Patrick Demesmaeker (European F18 champion, winner of St Barth Cata Cup etc) / Vincent Thery (Archipelago Raid veteran)
• SWE Fredrik Karlsson / Niklas Nordblom has won all F18 titles there is to win in the Nordics, except the raid. Will be smoking with their new boat with Deck Sweeper sail.
• SWE Leff Dahl (reigning F18 Raid World Champion) sailing with Ida Svensson (Olympic campaign in Nacra 17)
• GBR Archie Massey and Harvey Hillary with lots of Championship medals, but for the first time in the Stockholm Archipelago Raid.

To get on top on the podium in the mixed class the competition has never been as though. In addition to Leff and Ida you also have to beat teams like:

• Jakob Thun and Linda Sjö who finished 3rd in the mixed class last year tightly followed by…
• Therese Antman and Oscar Wetterling finishing 4th last year
• Manfred Zeissel and Eveline Haselsteiner are back with charged batteries
• Simon Skoog sailing with Sandra Sandqvist (both involved in the Artemis AC project) are sailing with a new Deck Sweeper sail

In the youth class (<26) there are two teams fighting for the gold medal: Lucy Nissen (1999) / Jai Tooley (2000) from Australia and Max Rehman Linder (1999) and Niklas Forhaug (2001) from Sweden.  Watch out for these young sailors a few years from now…