Tricky conclusion to Laser Radial Youth Worlds

Winners decided in Largs

After a highly charged day’s racing on the Clyde in some of the trickiest conditions of the week, Giovanni Coccoluto (ITL) and Erika Reineke (USA) have been crowned the new Laser Radial World Youth Champions.

The upper reaches of the Clyde just to the north of Cumbrae, provided the perfect stage for the final two races of this very competitive and enjoyable series, allowing competitors to really push to their full potential.

In tricky, shifty, light to moderate winds reaching no more than 8-15kts, 16-year-old Reineke from Fort Lauderdale, FL won the event with a race to spare, which is exactly what she set out to do when she left the shore this morning.

In what turned out to be her last race, she had a fairly conservative first beat but this bubbly, determined yet incredibly cool young sailor kept her head when the going was tough and worked her way to the top of the fleet finishing in fourth place, which was enough to secure the overall world championship title. The winner was Evgeniya Kuznetsova (RUS) who sailed an impressive race to take her first win of the week, followed by Amalie Riou (FRA) and Chiara Steinmueller (GER) in second and third respectively.

Reineke commented: “It feels amazing because I’ve never won a world championship. I think it’s a good start. I won the bronze at the ISAF worlds, I finished second at the Youth Europeans in Copenhagen. I started sailing in Optimists from Lauderdale YC. Actually I was hoping to win in Turkey but got the bronze so I came here all fired up to win. I knew I had to fight even harder to do well because I really wanted the gold.

“When I return home I’ll take a couple of weeks off but then I’ll start training again with an aim of doing the US Olympic trials. Paige Railey is an amazing sailor and I aspire to be like her, and Anna Tunnicliffe of course, so I hope to give them both a good trials. My ultimate aim is to race the Olympics.

“I have a great coach back home – Brad Funk – he has been working and training with me and he has really brought me a long way. As far as day to day training goes, I go to the gym three or four times a week, Saturdays and Sundays I sail Lasers, and Wednesdays after school. Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays I sail for High School. So, basically I sail every day except Friday when I’m usually travelling to regattas.”

Manami Doi (JPN) managed to retain her second place overall with a seventh in the last race, while Michelle Broekhuizen (NED) had to settle for third.

Today’s 7th and 37th may have ranked among his worst results of the week but the extremely cool-headed Italian – Giovanni Coccoluto from Circolo Della Vela Muggia – still managed to pull off an exceptionally impressive series to win the Laser Radial Youth Boys’ Championship.

Coccoluto, fresh from winning bronze at the recent ISAF Youth World Championship in Turkey, and winner of the 2009 Laser 4.7 European championship in Helsinki, bagged some consistently good results earlier this week which helped secure the overall title. He won the regatta by a margin of just two points over second placed Tadeusz Kubiak (POL). Kubiak who comes from Szczecin, Poland had a fifth in the first race of the day but not surprisingly, was controlled by Coccoluto in the final race of the series.

Coccoluto commented: “I am very happy, I feel lost for words. I had a poor last race because it was very shifty but I managed to control the Polish sailor, Tadeusz Kubiak, who finished 29th in that race. I had to cover him quite a lot and it worked out for me in the end. It’s been a great regatta, and I’ve really enjoyed it. The competition here was exceptionally high which made it difficult to do well. Once I’ve celebrated here, I’m going back to Italy to compete at the Italian national championship which I’m looking forward to.”


Boys Overall Results (after 10 races, 2 discards)

1 Giovanni Coccoluto (ITA) 61pts
2 Tadeusz Kubiak (POL) 63pts
3 Luca Antognoli (ITA) 64pts
4 Stefano Mazzaferro (BRA) 74pts
5 Mitchell Kiss (USA) 76pts
6 Ioannis Beginas (GRE) 77pts

Girls Overall Results (after 11 races, 2 discards)

1 Erika Reineke (USA) 22pts
2 Manami Doi (JPN) 49pts
3 Michelle Broekhuizen (NED) 53pts
4 Chiara Steinmueller (GER) 68pts
5 Julia Vallo Arjonilla (ESP) 72pts
6 Tiril Bue (NOR) 72pts

Full results here