Australia takes the lead

Outteridge and Austin are leading the fleet at the 49er World Championship

Australia’s Nathan Outteridge and Ben Austin’s 49er skiff Olympic campaign is on track, the two scoring two bullets and a seventh place on day two to take the lead of the 49er World Championship hosted by the Sorrento Couta Sailing Boat Club.

With a race drop in place, Outteridge and Austin are three points ahead of yesterday’s leaders, brothers Peter and Soren Hansen from Denmark, who are relegated to second place overall. Their downfall was a 14 in race five, which they used as their race drop.

“We got two firsts and a seventh – we cleared out at the starts and just kept going fast – we led pretty much whole way from top mark in the first two races,” Outteridge said.

“In our third race (race six), someone tacked on top of us and we couldn’t get away, but we were happy to make seventh. It could have been worse,” the 22 year old said.

“Our major threats are the Hansen brothers and the defending world champions Stevie and Ben (Morrison and Rhodes from Great Britain). I wouldn’t rule out the Olympic gold medallists from Athens either (Iker Martinez and Xabi Fernandez),” he added.

Racing started on time in an 8-11 knot northerly, but lightened out to a top strength of around eight knots, averaging around five to six knots, turning nor-nor-easterly and shifty.

Morrison and Rhodes’ group was last off the blocks. Keeping good their promise to protect their world champion status, the pair scored an eighth, a fifth and a first to hang in at third place, using the eighth position as their drop. They are five points behind the leaders.

The Italian Sibello brothers, Pietro and Gianfraco, and Rodion Luka and George Leonchuck (UKR) respectively worked their way into fourth and fifth places after each won his group’s race six this afternoon. Both pairs came into their own in the fluky light winds.

Brazil’s hopes of qualifying for the Beijing Games to be sailed off Qingdao next year, moved closer to reality when Andrea Fonseca and Rodrigo Duarte scored a first, and eighth and a fourth for 12th place overall.

That was not the case for Irish brothers Russell and Matthew McGovern. “It’s not going according to plan,” said a disappointed Russell. The two finished their day with a tenth,12th, and an eighth and are 30th overall. “Racing is really good, tight – and nice wind, but things aren’t going so great for us. It’s tough, I hope we get more wind tomorrow, we’re better in that,” added Matthew.

Sorrento’s Will Phillips and Jon Newman had a fairly good day with a third, a fourth and 11th to be placed 17th overall, well ahead of some Olympians and high profile sailors.

Phillips commented this afternoon: “It’s great that the breeze stayed in today for our races. It would be good to have some stronger stuff though – we like that better. It was so shifty today, we couldn’t really use our local knowledge, but this is a great regatta.”

A tricky day for Race Officials with a couple of general recalls and incidents. In one group’s pre-start there was a pile-up at the start boat causing a few collisions. Seven competitors were Black Flagged, four OCS’d and others not finishing racing. It proved costly for those trying for Olympic qualification.