Minoprio pushes Mirsky in the pre-start. Image copyright Loris von Siebenthal/www.myimage.ch
by David Swete
Day two of racing here in St Moritz saw a very limited amount of sailing with only two races completed due to a lack of breeze, however these races were very important and decided the teams to qualify directly for the quarterfinals from our group.
With Sebastian Col, Mathieu Richard and Eric Monnin already qualifying from 'Group A' yesterday, the final two races of 'Group B' were completed today and we came out on top with 4 wins from our 5 races. Ian Williams and Jes Gram-Hansen also qualified from our pool each on 3 wins, but there is still hope for the remaining teams who will race in a repechage series to decide the remaining 2 places in the quarterfinals.
Although the wind shut out this afternoon and it was not possible to race the repechage series, Thursday morning's conditions were very similar to Wednesday's and saw us racing our final round robin matches in a shifty 8 knot breeze.
Our first race against the reigning World Tour Champion did not go according to plan. Ian came out fighting in a must-win match for him and held a slim lead off the start line. He sailed a very good tactical race and although we showed promise, he held on for a well deserved victory.
Having only won a single match during the round robin, Torvar Mirsky and his team were looking to get some consolation from their race against us. We were, however, extremely keen to qualify top of our group and after a very aggressive pre-start we had the advantage off the start-line.
We sailed very fast around the course and held a good lead going into the final run, but when we got tangled up in the match ahead of us, we were forced to gybe away from the finish line. Upon gybing back we had killed all of our speed allowing the crafty Australians to attack and sail us out to the other side of the course to gain control.
The umpires, however, deemed that Mirsky Racing Team had sailed us past our proper course and Torvar was handed a penalty. Whilst approaching the finish line they attempted to sail us into a position were they could complete their penalty turn and maintain the lead, but they did so in our water and although they completed their turn, they were given a second penalty that handed us the win.
On Friday we look forward to seeing who we will race in the quarterfinals when we take on the winner of the repechage series.
We would again like to acknowledge our long term sponsors FedEx Express and Ross Munro from Line 7, their ongoing support is making it possible for us to be over here in our long term quest to win the World Match Racing Tour. To the RNZYS and everyone else, thank you for your support.
BlackMatch Racing
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