Miami Olympic Classes Regatta - Day 2 British Report

STAR AND SOLING CREWS CHALLENGE FOR MIAMI TITLES

Great Britain's leading World Class Performance Star and Soling crews start the third day of racing at the Miami Olympic Classes Regatta in Florida with the lead in their sights.

Ian Walker (from Hamble in Hampshire) and Mark Covell (Emsworth in Hampshire) move into the provisional lead in the Star class after they clinched the third race of the series yesterday (the only race of the day) by mere inches from Daniel and Beat Stegmeier (Switzerland). Country mates Michael Hicks and David Munge showed superb speed to follow them across the line in third.

Then, series leaders Jose Van Der Ploeg and Rafael Trujillo (Spain) withdrew from the series after the 1992 Finn Olympic Gold Medallist decided to fly home to see his newborn child. This puts Walker and Covell, sailing United Airlines, one point in front of 1992 Bronze Medallist Ross McDonald and crew Kai Bjorn (Canada) going into today's scheduled two races.

"We had a good start and good speed and were in the middle when a big left shift came on the first beat. Most of the good guys were on the right so we were eighth and able to pull up on every leg. It is still early days and the discard will help all those who had a shocker today" commented Walker.

On the Soling course, Soling European Match Racing Champions Andy Beadsworth (Titchfield in Hampshire), Barry Parkin (Windlesham in Surrey) and Richard Sydenham (Hamble in Hampshire) have a 9 win/1 loss ratio although they still have five races to go to complete their first round robin as the light winds have slowed progress dramatically.

"All our races were pretty straight forward apart from our match against Hans Wallen (Sweden)" commented Beadsworth. "We had a slight hiccup against Brown (USA) when we split at the start and the breeze swung 20 degrees in his favour. It took us the whole race to catch him but we managed to pass him half way down the final run".

In their match against Hans Wallen the Swedish crew got the upperhand in the pre start after a dial down (pre start circling) and inflicted a penalty on Beadsworth. The British trio fought back on each leg of the course and by the final mark were in shouting distance, although with only one reach to the finish a clean scoreline was beyond their grasp.

However, at the finish line the race committees declared that both crews were premature starters. "It was a complete shock to every one," said Beadsworth. "There was an outside chance that a re-sail might come our way but after the protest hearing it was decided that neither boat was premature and the result stood"

Although Beadsworth and Wallen are tied on nine win each, Wallen, the former European, World and Pre Olympic champion was declared the winner of their match and holds the number one spot.

FLORIDA: Miami Olympic Classes Regatta (after day two):

Star class (after 3 races):
 1 Jose Van Der Ploeg & Rafael Trujillo (Esp) 5,1,15   - 21pts
 2 Ian Walker and Mark Covell           (GBR) 9,13,1   - 23pts
 3 Ross McDonald and Kai Bjorn          (Can) 8,7,12   - 27pts
Other British Placings:
14 Stuart Hudson and Chris Gowers           - 17,16,17 - 50pts
21 Michael Hicks and David Munge            - 34,28,3  - 65pts

Soling class (round robin one):                               won lost
1 Hans Wallen and Johan Barne and Magnus Auguston       (Swe)  9 - 1
2 Andy Beadsworth and Barry Parkin and Richard Sydenham (GBR)  9 - 1
3 Hans Spitzauer and Hanakamp  and Andreas Steinkogler  (Aut)  8 - 2

For further press information please contact Nigel Cherrie on:
Email: nigel.cherrie@rya.org.uk
Miami Olympic Classes Regatta website: www.ussailing.org/News/mocr00

RYA Team GBR sponsors:
World Class Performance: www.uksport.gov.uk
Sail for Gold: www.sailforgold.co.uk
Chernikeeff: www.chernikeeff.co.uk
Douglas Gill: www.douglasgill.com