Live Ocean Racing: Kiwis fifth overall after 11 races in EFT26's at Raid de Quiberon
by Sail-World.com/nz 6 Jun 2022 01:08 BST
Live Ocean Racing sailing on Day 1 of the Raid de Quiberon - June 2022 © Clement Gerbaud
Live Ocean Racing lay in fifth place overall in an eight boat fleet, at the end of Day 2 at Raid de Quiberon and the Final of the third event in the ETF26 circuit
They maintained their place on the leaderboard achieved after six races on Day 1 . All events have been sailed in the province Brittany in NW France.
The Kiwi team of Olivia Mackay, Jo Aleh, Alex Maloney, Erica Dawson and Molly Meech, rotated through the crew, sailing four-up.
The team started the six races of Day 1, well enough recording places of 4, 6, 4, 5 in the first four races, but finished seventh in each of the final two races of the day to drop down the points table, and were only one point clear of the sixth and seventh placed teams.
They finished the series on a high note placing second in two of the last three races, opening the day with a couple of fourth places. They also expanded their points differential from just 1pt over the sixth place competitor, to 15pts after the conclusion of Day 2's racing.
French crews dominated the top three places on the leaderboard, with Toroa Racing helmed by UK based NZer Mark Rijkse, and crewed by Tokyo2020 Silver medalists John Gimson and Anna Burnet (GBR) finished fourth overall, 10pts ahead of Live Ocean Racing, after Day 2
The new Danish team, Rock the Boat crewed by Olympic sailors Katja Salskov-Iversen, Anne-Marie Rindom and Christian Peter Lübeck from SailGP finished in eight overall.
The five regatta ETF series was conceived by Jean-Pierre Dick, the four times winner of the Transat Jacques Vabre Race, and the boats were designed by Guillaume Verdier, the naval architect behind the winning boat Emirates Team New Zealand for the 35th and 36th editions of the America's Cup.
Racing is now complete at Quiberon - next event is Foiling Week at Lake Garda, Italy.