Germans into the lead

Andy Rice reports on today's 49er action in Athens

After winning yesterday’s heat, Norwegians Christoffer Sundby and Frode Bovim consolidated their lead in the Olympic 49er regatta until scoring an OCS in the fourth heat today. This has handed the lead to their training partners from Germany, Marcus Baur and Max Groy, who came away from the second day with scores of 1,2,8. They lead the competition on 20 points, just 2 points ahead of Chris Draper and Simon Hiscocks from Great Britain.

Following two frustrating days of postponements and delays, the three scheduled heats went off more or less on time, beginning a breeze of 5-6 knots that had built to 11 knots by the end of racing. The key to success was finding a clear lane out of the start and picking off the shifts at the right time.

The Sibello brothers from Italy rounded in a pack of four in the first race of the afternoon, and pulled into a slender lead ahead of the Germans by being the first to gybe out of the starboard line. The Germans fought back to very nearly steal line honours from Italy, but missed the gun by two seconds.

Baur and Groy made no such mistake in the second, winning the heat from reigning Olympic Champion Thomas Johanson and fellow Finn Jukka Piirainen. The much-fancied Spanish team, reigning World Champions Iker Martinez and Xabier Fernandez, got caught up with the Norwegians and took a penalty 360 turn to make amends.

The breeze had built to solid twin-trapezing conditions by the final heat of the day, and three-time World Champion Chris Nicholson turned on some of the old magic with Gary Boyd to lead the race from start to finish. Just behind them at the windward mark were the Norwegians, only to be pulled out of the race by officials for having broken the start line a few minutes earlier. They weren’t the only ones, however, as USA, Japan and Poland all sailed home for an early shower. This is particularly damaging for the Poles, Marcin Czajkowski and Krzysztof Kierkowski, who having taken the winner’s gun in yesterday’s heat were subsequently disqualified. There has been no official announcement why, but it is believed an on-the-water measurer penalised them for failing to wear buoyancy aids – a very expensive and careless mistake if this was indeed the case. With a DSQ and an OCS they have already used up their two discards allowable in the 16-race series.

But with four different winners from four heats so far, the 49er class is unlikely to be decided as convincingly as we are seeing in some of the other Olympic fleets on the Saronic Gulf this week. Plenty of snakes, ladders and banana skins to come yet.