It was really champagne sailing today in La Ballena Alegre for Day One of the European Championship.
After the Race Committee had to wait a little while for displaying Orange flag, due to a shifty wind, the 72 registered teams have been provided with 3 superb races sailed by 12 to 15 knots. This first day has actually been a great one for the “Old Foxes”, three former Olympic Tornado campaigners taking a clear lead, scoring 9 to 14 points, when the first Rookies, Henri Demesmaeker and Morgan Wirtz, got provisional place 4 with 22 points.
It is then to notice the pretty good performance of two other father & son teams from Netherlands, Hans & Marius van Dam and Ad & Maarten Noordzij, the same way it is to remark grouped shooting from Italian squad, getting 5, 7, 8 & 9…
As Brett Burvill said at the wet bar after the racing “It was good to compete so tightly with my fellow mates Paschalidis/Trigonis and Mitch Booth, even I am not that happy with my third race where we finished 8th… We have a good speed, thanks to the decksweeper mainsail tailored by my crew Max Puttman from Next Gen Sails, and I am happy with the stiffness of my Edge platform, I keep building in Vinylester…”
The International Jury was present on the course, and five boats have been protested for infringements to rule 28 or to rule 31. Apart from this, competition has been clear and fair, and everybody looked happy around the bar. Three more races to be sailed tomorrow, warning signal being scheduled at 01:00 pm, Spanish time. Based on wheather forecast, this should be one more champagne sailing day…
Complete results on event website.
Pictures by courtesy of Marc Gonzalez Aloma @mgaloma