Finn class at ISAF Sailing World Cup Hyeres - Day 3
by Robert Deaves, International Finn Association 24 Apr 2014 07:54 BST
19-26 April 2014
Pieter-Jan Postma leads Deniss Karpak on day 3 of ISAF Sailing World Cup Hyeres © Thom Touw /
www.thomtouw.com
Pieter-Jan Postma (NED) took control of proceedings on the third day of the ISAF Sailing World Cup Hyeres with two great victories to take a commanding lead at the top of the scoresheet at the half way stage. He holds an 18 point lead over Caleb Paine (USA) and 19 over third placed Thomas Le Breton (FRA).
After a short postponement due to lack of wind, the breeze kicked in as predicted and the fleet enjoyed two races in 12-16 knots.
In the first race of the day, the leaders favoured the right hand side with Postma rounding ahead of Deniss Karpak (EST) and Bjorn Allansson (SWE). Postma maintained his lead throughout to win from Karpak by 35 seconds, while Giorgio Poggi (ITA) moved up from fifth at the first mark to third at the finish, with Allansson fourth.
Race 6 was much tighter, but Postma still lead all the way round, again from the right on the first upwind. This time Josh Junior (NZL) followed him round the windward mark with Allansson close behind. The top three made a little gap downwind but on the second beat Thomas Le Breton (FRA) found his way up to third, with Ivan Kljkakoivc Gaspic (CRO) in fourth. These two exchanged places on the final downwind, while Postma took his third win of the regatta by just 10 seconds from Junior.
After a 4, 5, the ISAF Sailing World Cup Melbourne winner Allansson now moves into the top 10 for the first time this week. He said, "Today we had a bit more wind, up to 16 knots and from 240 deg. I know I'm good in these conditions and two solid starts today really helped."
"In the first race I managed to win the start at the starting vessel, and was then able to ride over all the way to the left with good speed and pressure, rounding first mark in third."
"Before the second race I told PJ, that he had enough bullets and that I would win the race. I got a good start at the pin end, but PJ had a even better start and was able to tack in front of the entire fleet rather quickly. I was able to once again round the top mark in third which was great for me."
Jake Lilley (AUS) has had an up and down week and today collected a 7, 21 to sit in 14th overall. Commenting on a big improvement since the last event in Palma he said, "Palma was not the greatest for me. I was pretty sick and didn't sail very well. Since then, my coach (John Bertrand) and I have done a lot of analysis and hard work and made a lot of improvements in our game. The target for the year is the ISAF worlds and the Rio Test Event so we are just using Hyéres to learn as much as we can. Making the top 10 would be a bonus."
There are just four more races in the opening series, which continues until Friday, before the medal race for the top 10 on Saturday. All boats are now being tracked and this can be watched live online at: http://www.sailing.org/worldcup/multimedia/tracking.php
Results after Day 3: (top ten, 6 races)
1 NED 842, Pieter-Jan Postma 10pts
2 USA 6, Caleb Paine 28pts
3 FRA 29, Thomas Le Breton 29pts
4 NZL 24, Josh Junior 30pts
5 CRO 524, Ivan Kljakovic Gaspic 37pts
6 FRA 112, Jonathan Lobert 38pts
7 EST 2, Deniss Karpak 47pts
8 ITA 117, Giorgio Poggi 48pts
9 GRE 77, Ioannis Mitakis 49pts
10 SWE 6, Björn Allansson 49pts
Full results at http://registration.ffvoile.fr/swc2014/old/race/swisstiming/Finn/Finn-Fleet-Overall.pdf
swc.ffvoile.com/swc2014gbr