Fireball Euros Close in Lerwick, Irish Pair Finish Fourth Overall

1st August 2014

#fireball – Tom Gillard & Richard Anderton (GBR 15081) are the new Fireball European Champions. In today's final day of racing they won two of the three races to win the regatta, after discard, by a 6pt margin writes Cormac Bradley.
In 2nd place overall are Matt Burge & Richard Wagstaff (GBR 15093), followed by David Wade & Tim Hartley (GBR 15113) with these two being separated by 3pts.
The young Irish combination, Barry McCartin & Conor Kinsella (IRL 15114) finished fourth overall, losing out to Wade by a solitary point. However, they will be buoyed by the fact that they took the last race of the regatta to break the stranglehold that the British boats had on racer wins.
In 5th place overall are the Czech combination Jaroslav Verner and Jakub Napravnik (CZE 15110).
Principle Race Officer, Bruce Leask and his team, produced a hat-trick of three-race days to give the fleet a second discard, to the relief of some. Wind today was out of the east and started a bit light but grew stronger as the day wore on, so much so that the "pumping flag" was broken out for the last race.
Burge and Wagstaff's day came unstuck with some wayward results but in truth two race wins today for Gillard & Anderton is where the damage was done to the former's campaign. Wade and Hartley too had a good day with a 2, 3, 3, suite of results.
Among the ladies, Louise McKenna & Hermine O'Keeffe (IRL 14691) in 17th were first with Maja Suter & Thomas Boehm (SUI 14921) 5pts adrift of the Irish combination.
In home fleet terms, Will'm Mouatt and Neil Fraser (SHE 14402) take the honours, their regatta highlight being a 4th place finish in Race 8.

Homecoming Scotland 2014 Fireball European Championships
Lerwick, Shetland. Sail No. R1 R2 R3 R4 R5 R6 R7 R8 R9 Nett
1 Tom Gillard & Richard Anderton GBR 15081 4 2 2 1 3 1 1 1 2 10
2 Matt Burge & Richard Wagstaff GBR 15093 5 1 1 2 1 2 7 5 4 16
3 David Wade & Tim Hartley GBR 15113 2 4 4 4 2 3 2 3 3 19
4 Barry McCartin & Conor Kinsella IRL 15114 1 6 6 3 4 5 4 2 1 20
5 Jaroslav Verner & Jakub Napravnik CZE 15110 3 3 3 5 6 6 8 6 5 31
6 Jiri Paruzek & Jakub Kosvica CZE 14551 8 7 5 6 5 14 3 27 6 40
7 Alex Taylor & Geoff Edwards GBR 15046 6 5 7 7 27 4 5 27 7 41
8 Will'm Mouatt & Neil Fraser SHE 14402 27 11 8 9 9 16 6 4 9 56
9 Scott Nicolson & Roger Goudie SHE 14513 15 8 10 8 7 8 10 9 11 60
10 Frank Miller & Ismail Inan IRL 14713 13 10 11 12 10 9 12 15 12 76

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