Australia continue to hold top spots

Racing settles down again at the B14 Worlds in Tassie

With the fleet on the water for a morning start to try and recover the two race deficit on the schedule, it was an anxious wait whilst the wind filled in for the 50 teams.

Race 5 With a light southeast wind filling in across the start the fleet were a little too eager to get underway with the tide pushing the fleet over the line leading to 4 general recalls and 11 boats, including a number of the top teams falling foul of the black flag.

With the start successfully underway on the 5th attempt the fleet split left and right with Mark Barnes/Pete Nicholson ( Seavolution) leading the pack in from the left maintaining their lead over lap two from Chris Bines/Dave Gibbons ( Quinta Raddison Ltd) and Nick Richardson/Alan Nicholas ( Pigs Arse).

Race 6 and the fleet had learned to behave and got away cleanly at the first attempt. With many teams predicting the shift on the left of course being caught out by a big right hand shift. Dave Hayes/Sean Dwyer ( MJF/North) capitalising on a good start from the committee boat end and leading in from the right hand side by a big margin maintaining this to finish first from Guy Bancroft/Nick Darlow ( Sly Bone) and the consistent Pigs Arse third.

Race 7 and with the breeze slowly building the fleet again got away cleanly with a break left and right for the leading packs. Special mention must go to Tim Harrison/Johnny Radcliffe ( Anthill Mob) for spectacularly failing to cross the fleet on port!

Alan Davis/Toby Barnsley-Dale ( Hyde Sails) looked good leading the pack out the right with Quinta Raddison Ltd and Mark Watts/George Morris ( Simmons&Simmons) coming in hard from the left to lead one two round the top mark. Down the run the lead pack split at the bottom with Simmons&Simmons leading round the bottom mark from Sly Bone and Richie Reynolds/Lissa McMillan ( The Nude). With a consistent breeze up the final beat Quinta Raddison Ltd led from Simmons&Simmons losing out at the finish by a nose to Simmons&Simmons with The Nude third.

Race 8 and with another clean start the fleet again split up the beat. The first run saw a big hole with The Nude capitalising to take a good lead at the bottom mark from Nick Craig/Matt Johnson ( Team Gill). The Nude continued to finish strongly in first from Team Gill and Peter Ray/Karen Branch ( Octopussy).

Many sore heads were seen on the race course following last nights return of the Sambuca challenge pub crawl sponsored by Kelvin! Possibly explaining the fleet’s inability to start in the first race of the day!

With today’s conditions providing more consistency, great racing and many of the event favourites recovering their form tomorrow is set for a big finale! Will the UK Team retain the ashes or will the Aussies finally get their hands on them