Sailing Magazine
The 49er Worlds kicks off officially today with measurements, registration and all the other officialdom required in a championship event. Racing starts on Monday.
For our RSA team of Graeme Willcox and Andrew Tarboton, it’s crunch time as their aspirations and dreams of competing in the Olympics in Rio next year will either be realised – or dashed!
There are just 3 qualifying positions available at this event, and these guys need to secure one of them to join their team mates, Stefano Marcia (Laser) and Roger Hudson/Asenathi Jim (470) in Rio next year.
After the South American champs, this is what Willcox said: “The final day of the South American’s was again a light affair. With single wiring conditions and sometimes less all day, except the last lap of the last race where it got up enough to be double wiring. We had some bad luck at the starts today with a team barging in on us in one, and another fowling us in another. But we manger to get ourselves out of the mess and back into the race by the top mark. We felt we lacked a bit of straight line speed in the first race which we corrected in the second. So tight it’s and all about the small percentages. We were swallowed up by the pack and needed to work pretty hard to find clear air.
“On the whole we have been showing good speed and it just those small things, the last few percent which have been dropping us out of the good spots. We have 6 days of training before the worlds, so a good opportunity to work on these small things.”
Follow their progress and wish them all the luck possible.
