Irish sailors were tried and tested in a light Miami breeze yesterday with mid fleet results at best for Ireland's Olympic crews. In the mens 49er skiff Ryan Seaton and Matt McGovern from Belfast Lough were 51 from 61. A 'niggling' foot Injury has forced the withdrawal of 49erfx campaigners Andrea Brewster and Saskia Tidey who stayed shoreside in Biscayne Bay. In the women's Radial Annalise Murphy (36th) continues to stay clear ahead of Aoife Hopkins (47th) in the second round of the womens trial but both Irish single-handers will be happy to see the back of day one in their 60–boat fleet.
Yesterday, was the big start for Olympic and Paralympic sailing in 2016 with 711 sailors afloat.
Laser and Laser Radial
It was a 'head out the boat' kind of day with sailors looking to play the shifts and read the current to advance in large packs of racers. The morning opened with 4-6 knots from the north that slowly swung to the east, coming in at 7 knots and peaking at 10.
Only the Laser fleet completed the scheduled number of races in what was a challenging day for sailors and officials alike. Four days of fleet racing remain ensuring adequate time to catch up on races lost ahead of Saturday's live Medal Races that will be available to view on YouTube worldwide and on ESPN3 in the USA.
Racing resumes this morning at 10:00 local time. Having lost races on Monday, the Race Committee will use the day to catch up on the schedule.
Dutch sailor Rutger van Schaardenburg knows the importance of not risking too much during the first few races of the regatta. But he's not afraid of opportunity. So when the opening's presented themselves during the first two races in the Yellow group of the Laser division, he pounced. The reward: a pair of first-place finishes.
"It's obviously an ideal start,” said the lanky Dutchman. "For me it was important not to have very bad races because tricky wind conditions today—light wind [that] could come from any direction—so I didn't want to start with a bad result and that worked out.”
The first race was a wire-to-wire win, by nearly two minutes over the second place boat. The second required some work, and van Schaardenburg isn't afraid to say, a little help from above after struggling off the line. The comeback could be broken into two distinct components. Halfway up the first beat, a favourable shift helped him to get back in touch with the lead group. Then he was able to move from 10th to first on the run.
"Downwind [it was] both being in the pressure and having the opportunity to go quick not having anyone on the back blocking the wind from me,” said van Schaardenburg. "Freedom, pressure and obviously the boatspeed was good.”
Milivoj Dukic of Montenegro also had a strong day with a third and a second, as did van Schaardenburg's countryman, Nicholas Heiner, who stands third with nine points.
With their start pushed back due to the mid-day lull in the breeze, the first of two fleets of Laser Radials didn't get started until after 15:00 local time, and the second didn't cross the line until after 16:00. In both groups a familiar face lead the way around the track. Anne-Marie Rindom (DEN), the reigning world champion, won the earlier race, beating Emma Plasschaert (BEL) by 18 seconds. In the second group, it was London 2012 Olympic Gold medalist Lijia Xu (CHN) crossing the line first, followed by Silvia Zennaro (ITA).
49er and 49erFX
Following two races in the Blue and Yellow 49er fleets, Nico Delle-Karth and Nikolaus Resch (AUT) and Portugal's Jorge Lima and Jose Costa are tied on four points after a bullet and a third apiece.
However, the top of the pack could be different. Having won the opening race in the Yellow fleet Jonas Warrer and Anders Thomsen (DEN) crossed the finish line of the second thinking they had the perfect start with back to back victories.
Unfortunately, it was not to be as the pair were black flagged as Warrer explained, "We were a little surprised by the current. I think we got caught about a minute, half a minute before. We won the race even though we had a bad start and we sailed well, we're happy about that but it's a shame that we were over the line, that's life. It's important that we sailed well.”
Counting the 32nd the Danes sit in 25th but Warrer and Thomsen won't be disheartened. They know the venue well, taking bronze together in 2015 with Warrer winning gold in 2014 with Peter Lang.
"We like Miami and the shifty stuff as we're used to shifty conditions from back home,” said Warrer.
"It's good to come over here this time of year. We've come from cold, grey and raining in Denmark and Miami is a good place to sail.
"The level is high, it's always like this with a year until the Olympics. Everybody is improving, including ourselves and the level goes up. A lot of boats can win races. You can be punished for even small mistakes.”
Sailing World Cup Miami acts as a Danish qualifier for Rio 2016 but Warrer and Thomsen are left uncontested so will book their spot to the Olympic Games this week.
After a number of years of Danish skiff success, resulting in Warrer winning gold at Beijing 2008 and Allan Norregaard and Peter Lang picking up bronze at London 2012 the lack of strong Danish skiff crews in Miami can be seen as a bit of surprise.
"I guess I scared everybody away,” smiled Warrer. "It's a shame but most of the sailors were my age and stopped, wanting to try something else. We have good young crews coming up but they need one, two or three years more.
"It is a challenge for us as we need to find someone outside of Denmark to train and to push us. We've found that. We are training with the Germans and it's a really good cooperation and good teamwork. It's good for us as they're based in Kiel but it would be easier if we had some Danish crews at our level. Give it two years though and it will come.”
For now, the Danes are focusing on racing in Miami and have four further races on Tuesday that they will use to propel themselves up the leaderboard. The day's other race win went the way of France's Kévin Fischer and Yann Jauvin.
In the 34-boat 49erFX pack, Norwegian twins Ragna and Maia Agerup took the single race win late in the day. They were followed by Danish sisters Maiken Foght and Anne-Julie Schütt.
Four races follow for both fleets on Tuesday. The 49er Blue fleet will start at 10:00, Yellow at 10:20 and the 49erFX at 14:00.
Class leaders:
2.4 Meter (1 race sailed): Bruce Millar, CAN
470 Men (1): Asenathi Jim / Roger Hudson, RSA
470 Women (1): Fernanndo Oliveria / Ana Luiza Barbachan, BRA
49er Men (2): Jorge Lima / Jose Costa, POR
49er FX Women (2): Ragna Agerup / Maia Agerup, NOR
Finn (1): Jonas Hogh-Christensen, DEN
Laser Men (2): Rutger van Schaardenburg, NED
Laser Radial Women (1): Lijia Xu, CHN
Nacra 17 (2): Mandy Mulder / Coen de Koning, NED
RS:X Men (1): Chunzhuang Liu, CHN
RS:X Women (1): Lillan De Geus, NED
SKUD 18: no results posted
Sonar (1): Bruno Jourdren / Eric Flageul / Nicolas Vimont-Vicary, FRA
Full results here.
