Mark Lloyd / Extreme Sailing Series

Artemis creeps further ahead

Boston rolls out to see the Extreme Sailing Series

Saturday July 2nd 2011, Author: Lou Newlands, Location: United States

Day three of the Extreme Sailing Series in Boston saw the thousands of spectators filling Race Village treated to a spectacle of 49er racing followed by eight action-packed Extreme 40 races.

The 7-12 knot sea breeze allowed the Extreme 40s to showcase how this style of stadium racing really works, with live onboard commentary from leading US multihull sailor Cam Lewis and Britain’s Andy Green. The start/finish area located just a few meters off the shore gave the public a close-up view of all the action and the crowd were truly behind Terry Hutchinson’s Artemis Racing, cheering the team home every time. Fifth man guest Dennis Piretra was impressed by the public support: “We could see people up and down the docks watching with a lot of people really engaged. It’s not just a social event they are really enjoying the sport.”

Racing for the six-boat 49er fleet filled in the gaps in the entertainment with three teams from the USA and three from Canada. As the Extreme 40 circuit returns to European waters in August, the European 49er class will form part of the circuit competing for the 49er Europe Cup at the Extreme Sailing Series.

The top five places on the overall leaderboard remain unchanged with Artemis Racing holding the top spot, although three races from the end of day the Swedish team momentarily lost their lead to The Wave, Muscat. Leigh McMillan had a wobbly start to the day posting a 9th and a 6th giving Dean Barker’s Emirates Team New Zealand to chance to overhaul the Omani team. But a last place in the fifth race of the day for the Kiwis, gave McMillan’s team the opportunity to get back.

Pierre Pennec’s all-French team on Groupe Edmond de Rothschild had a mixed bag of results – their best a first place in the third race of the day, and their worst a 9th – but they are still only two points behind the Kiwis: “Racing was good for us,” said tactician Hervé Cunningham. “It could have been much better as we had a few penalties which was not ideal. We have the speed, we need to be a bit more aggressive on the starts. Tomorrow we will try to finish every race in the top three.”

Max Sirena’s Luna Rossa team had a better day, leaving them just four points adrift of the French at the halfway stage. However, the ‘stand-out’ team of the day was the Swiss team Alinghi, posting three race wins: “It is the first time in the season that we have three race wins in one day, so we are very happy,” said Tanguy Cariou. “The beginning of the event was quite tough for us and we were disappointed with that but we have tried to close the gap. We have been more aggressive with our sailing and had some good starts.”

Britain’s Ian Williams, skipper of Team GAC Pindar, nearly scored their first race win of Act 4 and were leading round the final top mark in the fourth race of the day before a twist in the gennaker spoiled ruined that prospect. However, the team’s improved performance today allowed them to leap-frog Roland Gaebler’s Team Extreme on the overall leaderboard.

Going into the penultimate day 22 races have been staged so far and with a potential 12-14 races still on offer the teams have plenty of points to play for.

49er Teams at Act 4, Boston:

Trevor Parekh/Matt Dubreucq – CAN
Zach Brown/ Thomas Barrows– USA
Rob Frost/Tom Arbuckle – CAN
Mike Brodeur/Tom Carlton – CAN
Jon Goldsberry/Charlie Smythe – USA
Max Fraser/Dan Morris – USA

Current overall standings after 22 races, Day 3

Position / Team / Skipper & crew / Points
1st Artemis Racing (SWE), Terry Hutchinson / Sean Clarkson / Morgan Trubovich / Julien Cressant 169 points
2nd The Wave, Muscat (OMA), Leigh McMillan / Kyle Langford / Nick Hutton / Khamis Al Anbouri 159 points
3rd Emirates Team New Zealand (NZL), Dean Barker / Adam Beashel / James Dagg / Jeremy Lomas 158 points
4th Groupe Edmond de Rothschild (FRA), Pierre Pennec / Christophe Espagnon / Thierry Fouchier / Hervé Cunningham 156 points
5th Luna Rossa (ITA), Max Sirena / Paul Campbell-James / Alister Richardson / Manuel Modena 151 points
6th Red Bull Extreme Sailing (AUT), Roman Hagara / Hans Peter Steinacher / Will Howden / Craig Monk 148.2* points
7th Alinghi (SUI), Tanguy Cariou / Yann Guichard / Nils Frei / Yves Detrey 141 points
8th Niceforyou (ITA), Alberto Barovier / Mark Bulkeley / Daniele de Luca Simone de Mari 114 points
9th Oman Air (OMA), Sidney Gavignet / Kinley Fowler / David Carr / Nasser Al Mashari 106 points
10th Team GAC Pindar (GBR), Ian Williams / Mark Ivey / Andrew Walsh / Jono Macbeth 83 points
11th Team Extreme (EUR), Roland Gaebler / Bruno Dubois / Sebbe Godefroid / Bob Merrick 72 points

Full results here

Artemis Racing trimmer, Morgan Trubovich reports: "Okay. Eight races? They are truly trying to wear us out. But it was the best day of racing so far. Bright blue skies and a very nice 7-12 knot sea breeze. The racing was so close to the shore that the committee boat was actually tied to the spectator wall all day! That was another first for us! But it made it pretty cool for the thousands of people who lined the shore to watch the racing.

"Today had potential to be a very tough day for us. The nature of the races were such that if you wanted to win a race you needed to win the pin end of the line at the start. But if you tried to battle every other team for that start there was going to be one winner and a bunch of losers. This made it difficult for us as our style has always been conservative. Not going for the win but rather trying to chip chip away and have good results in the top 4 or 5 in every race. No double digits. It was hard to be conservative today as you knew that you were giving away the chance to win races. In the end our results of 2,9,3,7,6,10,2,2 were actually enough to stretch our painfully narrow lead over second place by a few points.

"So going into tomorrow we have a 10 point lead over The Wave and 11 points over Emirates Team New Zealand. Plenty to play for with the potential of another 14 races over the next two days.

"We are all exhausted – but tomorrow we FIGHT!"

 

 

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