420 Europeans at Athens, Greece

GBR sailors Luke Patience and Adam Wagner finish 2nd at the 420 Europeans © John Patience

Luke Patience and Adam Wagner from Scotland won a silver medal at the recent 420 European Champinships held in Athens ,Greece after finishing in 2nd place in a fleet of 97 boats. The event was hosted by the Royal Yacht Club of Greece in Piraeus and coincided with the Saronics regatta for Olympic classes which were sailed on an adjacent course.

The championships were sailed over 6 days with a qualifying series of 6 races to split the fleet into gold and silver and was followed by a final series of 10 races. Luke and Adam won the qualifying series and maintained their 1st place on the results board until the final day when the local Greek sailor, George Vassilis ,pipped them to the post in the final race. The pair scored 6 first places in total out of the 16 races including 3 firsts in one day.

The weather conditions were extremely testing with the predominant northerly winds gusting across the course from 5-10 kts up to 25-30kts and in temperatures in the upper 30 deg C. Luke and Adam ,fresh from their top 10 finish at the recent 420 World Championships in Hayling Island ,dominated the racing in the breezy conditions ,winning a number of races by significant margins.

In the girls results ,Charlotte Savage and Maia Walsh from the UK, and last years girls champions finished in 22nd place to secure the bronze medal in the girls fleet with the winner being camille Lecointre from France.

Callum MacDonald and Haakon Carlsen also from Scotland and Stewart Bithell and Jonathon McGovern finished in 4th and 7th place,to complete the excellent performance of the GBR Team in the top 10.

Overall Results: