Aaron Ciantar, pilot of the SuperSport championship-leading #44 Conam Yachts boat, has admitted that he and team boss and throttleman Angelo Tedeschi have been surprised by their dominant start to the 2008 Powerboat P1 season.

In an exclusive Powerboat P1 pilot diary, the Maltese powerboat ace talks in depth about the first four races of the year in Italy and France, and about the expectations he faces when racing in front of his home crowd in Malta this coming weekend.

“At the start of the season, I don’t think either myself or Angelo could have expected to have had so much success in the first four races of the year,” Ciantar says. “Although Angelo won the SuperSport championship with the same Chaudron boat and Mercury engine in 2007 – which means we know how good it is – this is the first time that Angelo and I have worked together. That means we started the season a little bit cautiously, but things seemed to have worked out pretty well so far!”

Ciantar has added pressure this weekend, as his family runs the Chaudron boat business. The #44 Conam Yachts entry that Ciantar and Tedeschi run uses a Chaudron 41 hull and Mercury engines. “I also have another interest in how well our Chaudron boat does in the race, as Chaudron is my family’s business,” Ciantar says. “The family is all very hands on in the company, so being successful in Powerboat P1 is very important to us.”