Looking at the results this morning, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Nathan Outteridge and Iain Jensen were still in San Francisco, being that they only just made the first page of the results sheet! Qualifying in 17th for the semi-finals and with a string of results below 15 in the first 4 races of the Gold fleet, Outteridge and Jensen had a lot on to make the Top 9 to qualify for tomorrow’s finals. The Australians showed masterful sailing today, especially downwind, sailing just under a minute less downwind than anyone else today. The Kiwi pairing of Burling & Tuke also performed expertly today jumping from 4th to 1st during today’s races!
In the FX fleet, after a shaky first race, the Kiwi pair of Maloney and Meech got top 3 results in the last 3 races of the qualifying series, putting them 9 points clear of the French pairing of Steyaert & Bossard.
The Magic Marine Starting Points Competition
Yet again, the French team of Steyaert & Bossard secured the green jersey, proving that they really have been the best starting team this week! Today, Tunnicliffe and Vandermoer showed that they have the ability to start really well, but couldn’t hold on for the second half of the race. The Kiwi pair started well across the board to secure the lead going into the final day .
In the boy’s fleet, another French team (Dyen / Christidis) took the green jersey followed by Pinky & Wheeler in GBR 19, who were very close to getting a top 2 result behind Nathan and Ian, but put it in on the final downwind leg, meaning they struggled to qualify for the finals tomorrow.
The Seiko King & Queen of Downwind Competition
The current Olympic champions today showed that they hadn’t lost it after their year break from the class (apparently something was happening in San Fran?!). Showing outstanding speed downwind and the ability to comeback from slow starts mean the boys from downunder have secured their place in tomorrow’s theatre style racing and are still well in with a chance of medalling. Nathan and Ian haven’t scored lower than a 6th at a world championships, and are current world and Olympic champions, so it’s not all over yet! Can they pull off a comeback of Oracle proportions!?
Also performing extremely well today were the Kiwi pairing of Tuke and Burling, who unfortunately had technical issues with their tracker, meaning we don’t have any proper data from today, however given their results, I’m sure they would be right up there with with Nathan and Iain.
In the girl’s fleet, the German pairing of Jurczok & Lorenz sailed extremely well downwind to gain the purple jersey today. Today’s scores put the pair in 6th place overall. With a great score card today, the Danish pair of Nielsen & Olsen were close behind in second place followed by Grael & Kunze in 3rd place, showing great speed today.
Tomorrow is the last day of competition tomorrow. In both classes, we will see three races comprising the petite final, this will be made up of sailors who came 10th – 20th in the Gold Fleet, with the winner of the series progressing through to the finals. The finals will be made up of 3 theatre style races, finally crowning the world champion of this years Seiko 49er and 49erFX World Championships!
Can the Kiwis hold the top spot? Can the Australians mount a comeback to rival Oracle’s or can the home sailors pip the Antipodeans to the top spot!
