38 boats in the Portuguese sailing Mecca
On the first day of the 2021 Cascais 49er & 49er Fx Championship, the Olympic fleet composed of 28 boats, of the 49erFx class, plus 10 boats, of the 49er class, fulfilled the day’s schedule when holding the three scheduled races for each class.
The ladies’ fleet, which started the day, found the Guia race course in the morning, with the classic conditions of that local with wind in the northwest quadrant with 15 knots of intensity. The French team of Lili Sebesi and Yann Jauvin closed the opening day at podium top position with a bullet in the second race of the day. The runner ups, two points behind the leadership, are the world champions in title, the Spanish Tamara Echegoyen and Paula Barceló. Closing the podium are the gold medalists at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, Martine Grael and Kahena Kunze from Brazil.
In the 49er men’s Olympic class, they started racing around 3:00 pm after the organization was forced to change its position on the race course due to the strong wind that was felt in the place where the female fleet fulfilled its schedule during the morning. With the wind blowing from the same direction as in the morning but rising to the 20 knots of intensity the boys also fulfilled the program scheduled for the inaugural day. American duo composed by Ian Barrows and Hans Henken leads the championship after two bullets in the last two races of the day. In second place are the leaders compatriots Nevin Snow and Dane Wilson. In the lowest position of the podium are the Frenchs Robert Solune and Sipan Valentin
In total, in the two races, 4 continents are represented – America, Europe, Asia and Oceania – in a total of 19 nationalities will sail in the bay of Cascais.
This championship has the support of Turismo de Portugal, Visit Cascais, Cascais Town Hall, Cascais Marina and Vista Alegre.
