470 World Championship at Sdot Yam Sailing Club, Israel - Day 3
by Andy Rice 26 Oct 2022 18:42 BST
24-29 October 2022
Britannia rules the waves but France wins the day
Day three of the 470 World Championship in Sdot Yam, Israel, marked the start of gold fleet competition. As a national effort, two different teams from Great Britain each won a race but for individual effort the best day went to Camille Lecointre & Jérémie Mion (FRA) who finished behind the Brits but scored a remarkable two second places.
Rocketing up the rankings
No one else could come close to the French level of consistency, with this new pairing growing stronger by the day. At the end of the first day of the Worlds the French were in 24th place. By the end of day two, up to 10th place. This evening their two 2nds lift them to 2nd overall on the leaderboard, an incredible comeback from a difficult start.
Even more impressive is the fact that Lecointre has her two children, a five-year-old and a five-month-old with her. Mion commented: “Camille told me she was feeling tired this morning, which is not that surprising as she has to wake up at 4 o’clock in the morning. But she found the energy and we are really happy with how things went on the water.”
As for having her family with her at an important championship, Lecointre wouldn’t have it any other way. “It gives you energy and gives you an appreciation for what we do,” said the double Olympic medallist. “I’m really enjoying having them here and enjoying building a new team with Jérémie.”
Blinkers on
In the first gold fleet race, at least half of the 30-boat fleet made a good enough start to be able to hold their lane on starboard tack. However, with the offshore breeze most of the fleet decided to take the wind shifts up the middle of the course. To hedge their bets. No half measures for Vita Heathcote & Ryan Orr (GBR) however. “We knew from yesterday that the pressure was good over there on the left, and we knew before the start that we were going to commit, we weren’t going to muck around with the right-hand side. We had options to tack earlier but we were going fast and it felt good going all the way over there.”
Heathcote & Orr put in a truckload of effort into working the boat upwind and downwind, even when they were leading comfortably. “I’m going to sleep well tonight,” said Heathcote. For Orr, he’s only recently come back from a bad fall when he slipped and fell while rock climbing. Rather than wearing thin-soled rubber boots like most of the fleet he’s having to wear thick-soled, soft running trainers to cushion his feet and lower legs while the body is still in repair mode. None of that recent history seemed to hold him back today though. The team won the race by a comfortable margin. A respectable 9th place in the next race lifts the young British team up to 8th overall.
More tea, vicar?
In the next race it was down to the other GBR team to fly the flag for Great Britain, as Martin Wrigley & Eilidh McIntyre led the way around the first mark and were so far ahead that the only threat ever came from Lecointre and Mion. Asked what the Brits had been drinking this morning, Wrigley quipped: “British tea. We had it flown over specially and that’s making the difference.” Their race win lifts GBR1 to 12th overall and just three points out of the top 10.
Jordi Xammar & Nora Brugman (ESP) made a terrible job of the first windward leg of the first race, rounding the top mark in the late teens or early twenties. However the Spaniards kept on chipping away and somehow dragged themselves back to 8th place by the finish. Xammar puffed a big sigh of relief as he crossed the line and the two teammates fist-bumped, knowing that it’s that kind of 8th place that can win you a championship more than the glamorous race victories.
His 'n Hers, Hers 'n His
Currently the top 10 shows an even distribution of female/ male and male/ female combinations in the new era of Mixed 470 competition. The experiment seems to be working. However Brugman joked that she’s not tall enough. “When Jordi is hiking he is as tall as me on the trapeze,” she laughed. “It makes it very easy to have a face-to-face conversation while we’re racing.”
At one point the Spanish found themselves racing side by side with the yellow bib wearers, Luise Wanser & Philipp Autenrieth (GER). Struggling to match the German upwind pace, Brugman shouted: “Why aren’t we faster?” To which Xammar replied: “Because Philipp is 10 kilos heavier than you!”
Rising value of the Euro
The Spanish and the Germans are also side by side with each other in the boat park and there is a good banter between these friends on the shore. The fierce rivalry will continue, and at the moment Wanser & Autenrieth continue to set the standard. They scored a 6,4 today, the third best results from the session and have extended the Germans' overall lead to 6 points ahead of the rapidly improving French. Xammar and Brugman have rocketed up from 11th to 3rd overall although the points behind are very close with Italy’s Marco Gradoni & Alessandra Dubbini in 9th overall but only 5 points behind the Spanish. Super tight.
Another interesting statistic of the current top 10 is that it is wholly dominated by European crews. Best non-European team is China’s Jianyong Xu & Yahan Tu in 11th overall.
For the continuation of gold fleet racing on Thursday, first start time has been set for 1400 hours. For live tracking and live broadcast of the racing, go to www.sport5.co.il/articles.aspx?FolderID=6045&docID=418043
Results after Day 3: (top three, 7 races)
1. Luise Wanser & Philipp Autenrieth (GER), 21 points
2. Camille Lecointre & Jérémie Mion (FRA), 27 points
3. Jordi Xammar & Nora Brugman (ESP), 37 points
To get all the news, photos and updates from the racing, go to 2022worlds.470.org