470 World Championship at San Isidro, Argentina - Day 2
by International 470 Class Association 24 Feb 2016 06:13 GMT
20-27 February 2016
Race track challenges
Another light start to the day, with 2 knots the only breeze sniffing around the race track at the scheduled start time of 1400 hours. Postponements ashore saw teams relaxing around the venue and generally chilling in this very beautiful location at Club Nautico San Isidro.
Patience from the Race Committee and teams, as everyone waited for an opening in the weather, which eventually delivered around 1745 hours. Racing got underway in the late afternoon in an 8-9 knot easterly breeze, increasing to 10-11 knots, with pumping allowed.
Again the weather and race track made sure there was no margin for errors, with the tables turned in the 470 Men as the winners of both races yesterday, Paul Snow-Hansen/Daniel Wilcox (NZL), took a scoring penalty for being over the starting line. Defending World Champions and world #1 pair, Mat Belcher/Will Ryan (AUS), found themselves in the same position yesterday, but no mishap today as they picked up their game to claim the lead in the day's only race.
Control at the front of the 470 Women race changed mark by mark, until the Dutch pair of Afrodite Kyranakou/Anneloes van Veen found a speed advantage, and made a clear call to claim and hold the lead from the downwind gate to the finish. They now lead a three-way tiebreak.
470 Men
Despite a UFD penalty score, Paul Snow-Hansen/Daniel Wilcox hold firm and will be wearing the yellow leader's bibs on race day 3, as they discard their race 3 result.
"We ended up starting at the committee end of the line, and unfortunately were over," said Wilcox. "We felt like we sailed a good race, which was a positive, so hopefully we can just take forward the positives into tomorrow. Round the race course we were sailing really well, so are happy with what we did on the water."
After a long day, Mat Belcher/Will Ryan have redeemed yesterday's performance by making it a clean win today, and leaping up the leaderboard from 33rd to 11th.
"We managed to get off the line well and sail our own race," sail Belcher. "We were really happy with our performance and are now slowly trying to crawl our way back up to the top. It is really tight racing so it will be a long week for all,"
An upgrade from fifth going into the day to second at the end for Anton Dahlberg/Fredrik Bergstrom (SWE) after a second place result. Dahlberg is about to compete at his third Olympics, although it will be a first time appearance for crew Bergstrom, the 2011 470 Junior World Champion.
"It was a long day with a lot of waiting, so you knew in the end there was going to be a race, so you had to be on it, and ready to go. We feel confident with our speed and feel confident with our sailing, and we enjoy it here," said Dahlberg. "It's challenging, but it's a bit like sailing on a big lake with current."
Crossing race 3 in third pushes Germany's Ferdinand Gerz/Oliver Szymanski up to 12th overall.
Early days, but South Africa's Asenathi Jim/Roger Hudson mark their best ever opener to a 470 Championship, having steamed up to the top three from a solid 3,16, 6 scoreline. However, with just three races down, the recently crowned 470 African Champions are understandably cautious.
"It feels nice to be up there with the top guys and playing their game," smiled Jim. "The three races have been fantastic and we just need to keep the momentum going and keep building on what we have. We seem to have great speed and are making good calls," he added referring to their tactics around the track.
"Its early days, so we don't want to get ahead of ourselves," chipped in Hudson. "This is the first time in six years we have ever had a brand new boat and we spent ten days preparing it before the Worlds. We definitely have an extra shade of speed that we haven't had before, which is extremely helpful at a venue like this."
Climbs for some, drops for others, including Croatia's world #2 team of Sime Fantela/Igor Marenic, who fall four places after a 20th place today. Fantela/Marenic were the last to win a 470 Worlds before Mat Belcher started his dominance in 2010, which has seen the Australian win every 470 Worlds since. The Croatians almost overhauled the Aussies at the 2015 470 Worlds, but couldn't catch them in the medal race. Here though, the challenges of the race course are likely to leave the doors to the podium wide open to many teams right to the end.
"We had quite a good start, but we couldn't get to the right side where we wanted, so we ended up on the left. We managed to catch quite a few boats, and it was quite a horse race on the reach, so it was hard but we gained a few points and are happy with that," Marenic said about their day.
"It would be good to have a change at the top," reflected Marenic in respect of Belcher/Ryan's dominance, "but it is not just up to us. This regatta will be high scoring and we have only had three races. It is going to be really, really open, and despite their [the Australians'] bad day yesterday, they have every chance to do well."
470 Men Results after Day 2: (top ten, 3 races, full results here)
1. Paul Snow-Hansen/Daniel Willcox (NZL 2) - 2 pts
2. Anton Dahlberg/Fredrik Bergström (SWE 349) - 6 pts
3. Asenathi Jim/Roger Hudson (RSA 1) - 9 pts
4. Onán Barreiros Rodríguez/Juan Curbelo Cabrera (ESP 9) - 9 pts
5. Gabrio Zandona/Andrea Trani (ITA 2) - 10 pts
6. Sime Fantela/Igor Marenic (CRO 83) - 11 pts
7. Sofian Bouvet/Jérémie Mion (FRA 27) - 12 pts
8. Panagiotis Mantis/Pavlos Kagialis (GRE 1) - 15 pts
9. Geison Mendes/Gustavo Canal Thiesen (BRA 1) - 17 pts
10. Pierre Leboucher/Vincent Garos (FRA 44) - 21 pts
470 Women
Three teams on an equal 5 point scorecard sit at the top of the 470 Women leaderboard, with Afrodite Kyranakou/Anneloes van Veen aheda of Sydney Bolger/Carly Shevitz (USA) and Annie Haegar/Briana Provancha (USA).
When the time came, the Dutch pair of Kyranakou/van Veen put their foot on the pedal with some impressive downwind speed, to take the lead at the first downwind gate to the finish.
"It was a difficult day for everyone and a lot of current," commented Kyranakou on the conditions. "It was not something extreme today, just for the first time we took a good start and then we just did what the coach taught us to do. You know it was just normal, it was not something spectacular. It was a big step for us to have a good start, as yesterday we were battling a lot to keep up in the race. There's a long way to go and we will just keep going."
"It was challenging," commented Shevitz on their 4th place result. "We were happy, we had pretty good speed around the course and the Oscar flag saved us as we were able to be extra kinetic when we weren't happy with our position and really getting up and away from a lot of boats. Getting to the corner was key for us at the top of the course."
Defending World Champions Lara Vadlau/Jola Ogar have clambered up to 6th overall, from their second place.
"It was a really nice to sail this race today," commented the ever determined Vadlau. "It was kind of normal wind, really light, but not really, really light. The crews could stay a little on the trapeze and for us it is much better. When it is really, really light we have some problems, but now we are happy.
"It is tough here and hot and we have to stay focused all the time," she continued referring to the light wind conditions that tests the minds of all teams. "I didn't think we would race today, so we were pretty happy when the wind came through. The Race Committee did a really good job and congratulations to them – it was good."
Defending her World title is not going to be easy, as Vadlau acknowledged, "It is really, really easy to muck it up here. You know me, I always want to win. There are lots of good teams and it is really hard to stay consistent. For us it is normally our strength to stay consistent, but even for us it is hard. We will see."
Catapulting up the leaderboard go Spain's Sofia Toro/Nora Brugman, who finished 3rd and climb from 30th to 11th.
470 Women Results after Day 2: (top ten, 3 races, full results here)
1. Afrodite Zegers-Kyranakou/Anneloes Van Veen (NED 216) - 5 pts
2. Sydney Bolger/Carly Shevitz (USA 88) - 5 pts
3. Anne Haeger/Briana Provancha (USA 1712) - 5 pts
4. Camille Lecointre/Helene Defrance (FRA 9) - 6 pts
5. Xiaoli Wang/Lizhu Huang (CHN 1221) - 6 pts
6. Lara Vadlau/Jolanta Ogar (AUT 431) - 9 pts
7. Bàrbara Cornudella Ravetllat/Sara López Ravetllat (ESP 14) - 11 pts
8. Linda Fahrni/Maja Siegenthaler (SUI 5) - 12 pts
9. Fernanda Oliveira/Ana Luiza Barbachan (BRA 177) - 14 pts
10. Annika Bochmann/Marlene Steinherr (GER 72) - 17 pts
Three races are scheduled for both fleets tomorrow, with the first race of the day scheduled at 1200 hours for the 470 Men, followed by the 470 Women.
Participating Nations: (teams from 6 continents / 27 nations)
Argentina, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, France, Great Britain, Germany, Israel, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Poland, Portugal, Singapore, Slovenia, Spain, South Africa, Switzerland, Sweden, Turkey, USA.
Useful Links:
Light wind day (from Jodie Bakewell-White, Yachting New Zealand)
Racing continued today at both the 2016 470 World Championships (Argentina) and the 2016 RS:X World Championships (Israel) with New Zealand still holding the top spot in the men's 470 event after day two.
Conditions at the Argentinian venue of San Isidro, characterised by its brown silty tricky-to-read water, were very light and only one race was possible for both the men's and women's fleets on day two of their championship. Held ashore for most of the day it was around 5:45pm local time when racing got underway and close to 7pm when they finished.
After their dream start with two guns on day one, Paul Snow-Hansen and Daniel Willcox managed a solid race again today to cross the line 11th, only to learn they'd suffered a start line disqualification.
"We ended up starting at the committee end of the line, and unfortunately were over," said Willcox.
"We felt like we sailed a good race, which was a positive, so hopefully we can just take forward the positives into tomorrow. Round the race course we were sailing really well, so happy with what we did on the water."
However, because the kiwis can discard this result from their points score they remain in the overall lead, but are now under pressure to stay out of trouble, and produce more top results, to remain there.
Meanwhile Jo Aleh and Polly Powrie finished their race in 13th place which sees them slide to 12th overall on the women's leader board.
Ahead of today's racing they commented about the opening day; "Tricky day one of the Worlds, light winds and extremely close racing. We never quite got it right and had to battle it out in the mess that a 40 boat fleet in 5-10 knots turns into."
Racing resumes again in Argentina tomorrow for day three of the world title deciding regatta.
Overnight two races were sailed at the 2016 RS:X Women's World Championships where Natalia Kosinska has improved to lie 7th overall after a couple of great races in Eilat, Israel.
The sole kiwi representative placed 4th and then 3rd in her two races to climb from 16th to break into the top ten after two days of racing.
Defending World Champions Mat Belcher and Will Ryan jump up the ranks (from Cora Zillich, Australian Sailing)
Defending World Champions Mat Belcher (QLD) and Will Ryan (QLD) claimed a race win in the one and only race of day two at the 2016 470 World Championships in Buenos Aires, Argentina to jump up the ranks from 33rd into 11th. With this result Mat Belcher and Will Ryan move on from yesterday's (Monday, 22 Feb local time) UFD penalty and double-digit result and a start of the event that they would rather forget.
The three-time World Champion pair showed their experience and mental resilience on Tuesday, 23rd February to lock in the race win and change their scoresheet for the better. After the fleets had a late start waiting for the breeze to fill, only one race was completed.
"We managed to get off the line well and sail our own race. We were really happy with our performance and are now slowly trying to crawl our way back up to the top. It is really tight racing so it will be a long week for all," Mat Belcher said at the end of a long day.
And about the challenging conditions he added: "Once again it was a long day on the water. They delayed the start until two p.m., but unfortunately could not start until five p.m. in a slowly building sea breeze. It was pretty light, around four to six knots with over a knot of current and a lot of weed in the water."
Sailing out of Club Nautico in San Isidro and on the Rio de La Plata the silt from the delta turns the water brown, making it very hard to physically see the breeze on the water and to see where the breeze will come next.
In addition, the water is quite flat with more than one knot of current and a lot of weed at the moment, which makes racing complicated for the crews trying to not run over anything.
A total of three Australian Sailing men's crews are competing in Buenos Aires with Australian Sailing Squad's Patrick and Alexander Conway (NSW) posting a 21st and Victorians Tom Klemens and Tim Hannah a 28th to finishing day two in the Men's 470 fleet in 25th and 34th respectively.
In the women's fleet Australian Sailing Team's Carrie Smith (WA) and Jaime Ryan (QLD) climbed up one spot into overall 16th after posting a 19th in Tuesday's racing. Sasha Ryan (QLD) and Ella Clark (WA) finished right behind them in 20th and after a UFD on day one move up into 23rd in the 39-boats fleet.