January 24th, 2008 by 470 Team USA
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Dear Friends,
Five days after winning Sail Melbourne we are back on the racecourse for the 470 World Championships. The Worlds are being sailed out of Mordialloc Sailing Club, approximately seven miles south of
Sandringham. The wind and waves are essentially the same, so the races we sailed during Sail Melbourne should be directly applicable. The stakes are high here at the Worlds, and we have front row seats for the action! This regatta is the last chance for countries to qualify for the Olympics: there are 5 spots left and there are 16 teams fighting for those spots, of which at least 12 are very good. Additionally, many countries are using this regatta as part of their Olympic selections. Instead of having one regatta (for Americans, the Olympic Trials), many countries choose international regattas. The Chinese, Japanese, and Spanish teams, among others, are all racing for the Olympics.
We sailed two races today and finished 2nd(!) and 14th. We are currently 13th overall, and it is only the start of a long regatta. Points are extremely close. We are only 12 points out of 1st — as we saw last regatta, those points can be made up quickly! We have a total of three days of qualifying, and then four days of finals: the fleet will be split into Gold and Silver for January 27th. For complete scores, please visit the regatta website:http://www.yachting.org.au/site/yachting/event/11221/overall_2_1.html
For details from today’s racing, please read on! The forecast today was extremely unstable, with clouds keeping the normal sea-breeze from developing, so we really were not sure what we would get. We had 10 to 12 knots of a building breeze in the first race. It was that wind range where the harder you work, the faster you go — we were both sore by the end of the day. We had a great start in the middle of the line, and played the shifts well up the first beat. There was a large right shift on the first leg that put the Dutch team well into first. We were top five going up the middle, and reached the windward mark in 2nd! We lost a little, and then gained a little back, and finished the race in 2nd.
The wind and waves kept building in between races, so we set up for 15 knots. During the starting sequence we noticed a large left shift and adjusted our strategy to start at the left, pin, end of the line. We had a great start and were nicely headed off the line. Less than two minutes off the start, we tacked onto port, and could cross all of the boats save two — not bad! We again played the shifts up the middle-right of the course. The left continued to pay, but we reached the windward mark in 4th place. We held in that position downwind in big waves, with boats surging back and forth. Towards the bottom of the course, we gybed onto port towards the marks. As we converged with other boats, we misjudged the distance in between us due to the waves. We were on port and caused a starboard boat to alter course, fouling them. We immediately spun our penalty turns and lost much distance doing so. The wind died as we raced our second lap, and we could not catch up. We battled in the middle of the pack and ended up crossing the line 14th, so disappointing after our fantastic start!
Stay tuned for more news from down under!
Best,
Erin and Isabelle
470 Team
USAwww.470TeamUSA.com
erin@470TeamUSA.comisabelle@470TeamUSA.com
