Team Oman Air aims for back-to-back wins at GC32 World Championship
by Oman Sail 24 Jun 2019 16:41 BST
27-30 June 2019
Oman Air - GC32 Racing Tour - Villasimius Cup © Vincent Curutchet / Lloyd Images / Oman Sail
Team Oman Air heads into the GC32 World Championship aiming to build on their winning start to the 2019 season with a further victory this week in Portugal.
The championship marks the second event of the GC32 Racing Tour, with the Oman Air crew having emerged as worthy winners at the GC32 Villasimius Cup in Sardinia last month a clear nine points ahead of the chasing pack. Now the crew of the high-speed foiling catamaran will carry that momentum with them as they prepare for four days of competitive racing in Lagos, southern Portugal.
"It's looking good for Lagos," said Team Oman Air project manager and mainsail trimmer Pete Greenhalgh. "The team are up for it and we have all the bits and pieces to do the job - taking momentum into next event does no harm, that's for sure."
For 2019 long-standing Oman Sail team members Greenhalgh and Nasser Al Mashari have been re-joined by Stewart Dodson with the highly-rated New Zealand helmsman and skipper Adam Minoprio and experienced British sailor Adam Piggott adding further strength to the crew.
"There are just a couple of areas we need to work on, and get way better," said Greenhalgh. "With the new team combination it is exciting to have some pretty obvious things to work on and we are confident we can turn things around pretty quickly."
Having the event as a World Championship will give added impetus to the Oman Air crew as the team took a hard-fought third place podium finish on Lake Garda in the first ever GC32 worlds, having won the 'unofficial' World Championships the year before.
"It adds a bit of spice because it is a World Championship event," said Greenhalgh. "Some of the teams won't be doing a full season so they will ramp it up for this event, no question."
The Sardinia event was marked by unseasonably cool weather and almost wintery conditions, so the whole fleet will be hoping for warmer conditions - so long as there is wind to race in.
"As long as there is wind we won't be complaining, we can handle a bit of rain," said Al Mashari. "We will be training hard before the start of racing to turn the one or two weak areas we have into strengths - it is good to have some areas to focus on and improve."
The Oman Air team know they will face a stern test from Ernesto Bertarelli's Swiss team on Alinghi, runners-up in Sardinia, and Olympic gold medal winner Ben Ainslie's crew on INEOS Rebels UK, who took the final podium place. Reigning GC32 champion Franck Cammas and his Norauto crew will also be out to improve on their fourth place at the first event.