TeamOrigin protests Azzurra. Image copyright Ian Roman/TeamOrigin.
by Leslie Ryan
A masterful display of match racing in the pre-start of their second Louis Vuitton Trophy semi final match saw the TEAMORIGIN crew convincingly beat the Italian Azzurra crew to level the score to 1-1.
With the freshest breeze of the regatta to date blowing at 15 knots from the East and a significant swell running for TEAMORIGIN’s second semi final match against the Italian Azzurra, things were always going to be different from the first race defeat. Skipper Ben Ainslie had the favoured right hand entry, a strong and confident boat handling crew and Team Principal Sir Keith Mills on board as 18th man. Right from the entry it was clear Ainslie was in control, choosing not to dial-up beside the Italian at the last moment, and then managing to tack quickly around and start to hustle the opponent out to the extremities of the right hand side of the start box.
TeamOrigin downwind in big waves. Image copyright Ian Roman/TeamOrigin.
The Italians found a large spectator boat 400 metres along the startline extension to sail around and try and offload the chasing British team. The British afterguard, anticipating the move, sailed the other side of the same boat and caught the Italian in a compromised position trying to manouver, called foul and were awarded a penalty. 1-0 to Ainslie.
It wasn’t over. There were still two minutes to run to the start and Ainslie continued to harry the Italian back to the line at speed, still most definitely in control. In the last 30 seconds to the start with both on port tack heading for the committee boat it became clear that the Italian was going to be early and had no where to go. He could bail out to leeward of the committee boat or start prematurely. 2-0 to Ainslie. He chose the latter and managed to foul TEAMORIGIN a second time as well as needing to return around the committee boat to start correctly. 3-0 to Ainslie, and the British boat disappeared up the course to sail effectively unopposed and win by a margin of almost two and half minutes.
Sir Keith Mills, Team Principal, commented after the race “We had an awesome start today, Ben and the team gave Azzurra two penalties and pushed them over the line at the start. The guys sailed a perfect race – all to play for tomorrow though!”
TeamOrigin upwind in big waves. Image copyright Ian Roman/TeamOrigin.
Ben Ainslie, Skipper and Helmsman, added “It was great to finally race in some wind and waves. It was a ‘must win’ race for us, the guys did a great job all the way around. We have a long way to go yet in this competition being first on tomorrow.”
In the other semi-final today, Synergy evened the score with ETNZ and they are also on a 1:1 score line, there is however a protest pending from the 2nd race that Synergy won.
In the 5th to 8th sail-offs, BMWOracle beat TFS PagesJaunes and All4One beat Artemis, All4One then went on to beat BMWOracle to take the 5th overall position.
Lower placings:
5th All4One
6th BMWOracle Racing
7th Artemis
8th TFS Pages Jaunes
The first race tomorrow, Saturday 21st November, sees TEAMORIGIN take on Azzurra in the 3rd of their semi-finals race, start time 0840.
TeamOrigin
Louis Vuitton Trophy
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