Adam stays cool through the broach. Image copyright Loris von Siebenthal/WMRT.
by David Swete
Today was the opening day of the 2010 Danish Open World Match Racing Tour Event and with 2 wins from the 3 races we were involved in, it was a relatively good start for the team. We come into this event off the back of a 3rd placing only last week in St Moritz and are looking for a big result here to get our season back on track. This is the 7th leg of the World Tour and this year it is being held in a new venue on the island of Bornholm, located south of Sweden in the Baltic Sea.
Tight broach across the finishing line! Image copyright Loris von Siebenthal/WMRT.
Conditions today were some of the windiest and toughest seen on the World Tour this year, with action a plenty of which we were definitely part of. In our second race of the day against US wild card entry Mike Buckley, we managed to roll him on the final run before both boats were involved in a spectacular ‘broach’ right on the finish line. We had just gained the lead while approaching the finish at speed when we gained ‘mark room’ at the pin end of the line. The US team had to gybe to give us room, while we had to also gybe to make the finish line, however a huge gust hit and both boats were violently laid over on their sides. We actually finished the race on our side, with the spinnaker at the top of the rig... and it can all be seen in the video below:
Video from the WMRT of Mike Buckley broaching over the top of Adam Minoprio:
There were plenty of other incidents today including two men overboard, one being Olympic Gold Medalist Iain Percy from Ben Ainslies Team Origin, which just proves how trying the conditions were. There was also a major upset which again involved the US wild card and world number 665 Mike Buckley, who managed to defeat the current World Tour Leader Mathieu Richard.
Iain Percy goes for a dip. Image copyright Loris von Siebenthal/WMRT.
Our other win today came against fellow Kiwis William Tiller and his Full Metal Jacket Racing Team, while we had a loss to veteran Peter Gilmour. Not only are the conditions tough here but it is an extremely tough format, with only a single round robin and the top 4 teams progressing through to a semi final, so every win counts.
Crew of Mads Ebler testing the Baltic water temperature. Image copyright Loris von Siebenthal/WMRT.
We would again like to say a special thank you to our sponsors FedEx Express and Events Clothing/Line 7. Owen Rutter from Events Clothing has supplied us with new sailing gear this season, keeping the boys looking very sharp. The ongoing support of our sponsors is helping make this opportunity possible for the BlackMatch boys and we would also like to thank Emirates Team New Zealand and Steinlager Pure.
Results at the end of day one in Denmark:
Mirsky (AUS) 4-1
Gilmour (AUS) 3-0
Hansen (SWE) 3-2
Ainslie (GBR) 3-2
Bruni (ITA) 3-2
Minprio (NZL) 2-1
Richard (FRA) 2-1
Pace (FRA) 2-3
Ebler (DEN) 1-2
Buckley (USA) 1-2
Tiller (NZL) 0-3
Ward (DEN) 0-5
BlackMatch Racing this week is Adam Minoprio, Dan McLean, Tom Powrie, David Swete, Nick Blackman and local boy Jonas Frank Hviid-Nielsen.
BlackMatch Racing
World Match Racing Tour
