Radich on top in Berlin

Report from day one of the German match racing series

Sailors awoke with high expectations on the first day of racing at the Berlin Match Race, finding cold temperatures and moderate 8-12 knots breeze on bay Wannsee.

The race committee seperated the 12 boat fleet by world ranking position into two groups of which the three top boats in each advance on to the next round.

The first group started racing on time at 10 am and finished four out of five races passing the last and most important race on to Saturday morning. So far Ian Williams (GBR) is leading over Markus Wiser (GER) with three wins each closely followed by Karol Jablonski (POL) and Meister (GER) both with two wins.

In this group we expect more breathtaking racing tomorrow as Berlin local Meister has a good chance to proceed into the next round. If he wins the final race against Ian Williams, both would be tie and the German would move on.

The second group raced in the afternoon and was dominated by Jesper Radich (DEN) and Matthieu Richard (FRA) who both succeded into tomorrow´s the next round with one race in spare. Radich showed great tactical skills and boat handling by scoring four wins in four races.

The battle of the day was between Radich and Jochen Schuemann. Schuemann is sailing with his former Soling Olympic Bahr and Borkowski, the first time this has happened since Sydney.

This race was decided in the pre-start. Radich entered on starboard tack from the pin-end and forced Schuemann into a dial up. Schuemann escaped by sailing backwards and moved on to another counter attack. 20 seconds before the start signal Radich overlapped Schuemann to leeward close to the starting line and forced him eventually to tack which resulted in an a premature start for the German. Meanwhile Radich took off with a nice lift to the left side and dominated the race from start to finish. Schuemann closed the gap but had no chance to pass the experince Dane.

Schuemann definitely needs to win tomorrow against newcomer Horsch (GER) in order to advance to the next round.