It's those Russians from Synergy again! Robertson (NZL) leads Neugodnikov (RUS) in the pre-start. Image copyright Slovenia Match Race Cup.
by Jana Pines
Second day of Slovenia match race cup started with the rain but soon after morning's skippers meeting the sun came out. Even though the conditions weren’t promising, the race committee left the harbour on scheduled time and waited for the wind to stabilize on the sea. Around the noon everything was set and matches could finally have started.
First objective was to finish the round robin, but it took quite a while to realize it because of many delays, caused by the damages on the boats. Ratko Štibrič in fact enabled one of the boats by perforating its side, so the competition proceeded with only two pairs instead of three. Anyway, the race committee managed to finish the first round robin and almost got the second one done.
Close racing in Slovenia. Image copyright Slovenia Match Race Cup.
Amongst the nine crews Philip Roberston’s team was the one with major number of victories. Actually the Kiwis were the only team who haven’t lost a single match. Ian Ainslie (RSA) placed second with six wins out of eight, while Michele Perris from Monaco took the third place. Morvan, Neugodnikov and Simone Ferrarese are the other three skippers qualified for the second round robin but so far, the game is far from decided.
Combined round robin scores to date for top 6 (each competitor has 2 matches remaining) win-loss
Phil Robertson (NZL) 7-1
Michele Perris (MON) 4-4
Ian Ainslie (RSA) 4-4
Eugeniy Neugodnikov (RUS) 4-4
Pierre-Antoine Morvan (FRA) 3-5
Simone Ferrarse (ITA) 2-6
Note from SailRaceWin: It's clear from the results (updated after the report above was written) that Phil Robertson's Waka Racing team has qualified for the semi-finals. Also, many of the competitors in Slovenia were those at the Sails of the White Nights in St Petersburg last week, beaten by Reuben Corbett (NZL) and Black Sheep Racing. Black Sheep Racing are currently in La Rochelle, France, competing alongside SLAM Kiwi Match at the Coupe d'ete (Summer Cup).
Slovenia Match Race Cup
