BlackMatch Racing competing in Croatia. Image copyright Ante Verzotti.
by David Swete
Wednesday was the opening day of racing at the ACI Grade 1 Match Racing Event, held in the picturesque town of Split.
This is a very prestigious event and the calibre of the teams competing here is very high, with a field that includes world #3 Paulo Cian, former world #1 Sébastien Col and veteran match racer Bertrand Pacé who is a former helmsman for Team New Zealand.
Although the sun was shining, conditions today were extremely gusty with big wind shifts and the race committee had us racing the Jeanneau 36 yachts with a reef in the main and small #3 jibs for the majority of the day.
We had a mediocre start to the event and finished the day with 4 wins and 4 losses. With 10 teams competing, we only have one more team to race tomorrow morning to complete the first round robin and it will be a very important match against our Australasian counterparts from the Mirsky Racing Team.
The event format here is a double round robin followed by semi-finals and finals, so although we haven't had the best of starts to the regatta, the second round robin will be the telling factor.
The in-form teams so far are predictably the highest ranked teams in the ISAF rankings, along with the wily Frenchman, Bertrand Pacé. Col is leading with 0 losses followed by Mirsky and Cian each with 2 losses and Pacé with 3 losses.
BlackMatch are nipping at the heels of the leaders and a win against the Australians tomorrow will put us in good stead for the second round robin as we look to steadily improve here in Croatia and proceed to the semi-finals.
We would again like to say a special thank you to our sponsors: FedEx Express and Ross Munro from Line 7, their ongoing support is helping make this opportunity possible for the BlackMatch boys. To the RNZYS and everyone else, thank you for your support.
BlackMatch Racing
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