Sailing World Champs: Light Breeze Halts Finals Push

A mix of flat water, gentle breeze and shifting currents halted some Kiwis' progress on day four of the Sailing World Championships overnight.

But while no racing was possible in two classes, and curtailed in several others, Nacra 17 pair Micah Wilkinson and Erica Dawson picked up in gold-fleet racing where they had left off in qualifying.

Two single-figure scores saw them jump two places to eighth overall - and into one of the qualification spots for a boat at next year’s Olympic Games - with four races remaining.

The top nine mixed multihull crews at the end of the competition will secure an automatic Olympic entry for their country in the class before the focus will shift to qualifying individual crews for the showpiece.

A strong finish in their final three gold-fleet races in The Hague could also put the Kiwis firmly in contention for silverware ahead of the double-points medal race, after a day that saw plenty of movement among the front of the fleet.

Italian leaders Ruggero Tita and Caterina Banti failed to win a race for only the second time this week – the Italians scoring 9, 12 and 5 – while Wilkinson and Dawson’s 7, 6 and 11 put them 14 points off the bronze-medal position.

"Today was quite a different day with a light offshore breeze, so it was all about picking the shifts,” Dawson explained.

“The fleet was mixed up a lot more and a few of the leaders had some bigger scores, so all-in-all we had a reasonably consistent day.

“We’re not too unhappy with how we did - it definitely could have been worse.”

Meanwhile, Veerle ten Have will have to wait at least another 24 hours to make her debut at the world champs, with the country's leading female windfoiler spending a frustrating afternoon on the Scheveningen shore waiting for the breeze to fill in.

The 22-year-old Tauranga sailor, who won bronze at the Princess Sofia Regatta in Spain in April and narrowly missed out on a medal at last month’s Olympic test event in Marseille, leads a seven-strong Kiwi contingent in the class that also includes Aimee Bright and Stella Bilger.

Josh Armit, Thomas Crook, Eli Liefting and Patrick Haybittle earlier had a tough start to the men's competition.

Between them, Armit and Crook picked up three top-10 placings but struggled with their tactics in the fast-paced slalom format.

Armit finished the day in 29th, with Crook seven places behind. Liefting is 44th, and Haybittle 71st in the 93-board fleet.

“It was good to get the first day under the belt, but we know the guys can do a whole lot better,” said windfoil coach Nathan Handley.

“It’s early days though, we have up to 20 qualifying races in total, and we’ll be working hard to get some good results tomorrow and get further up the leaderboard.”

Justina Kitchen and Lukas Walton-Keim both started brightly in their respective kitefoil events.

Kitchen, fresh from a top-10 finish in Marseille, could only complete two of her scheduled races before the wind died but she is within striking distance of the early pacesetters thanks to a fourth place in her opening race.

“We had some huge shifts and really tricky racing, but it was great to have a nice one to start with,” she said.

“There were plenty of close calls in my second race and I felt like I could have definitely got a bit higher but I’m really looking forward to racing tomorrow and getting back on schedule.”

Walton-Keim also showed promising signs as he continues his comeback from a seven-month-long injury layoff.

Three top-10 results have him placed just outside the 25-board cut-off for the gold fleet – a big goal for the Aucklander.

“I had a pretty good day, I thought. It's really tough racing, as always, but I performed pretty well,” Walton-Keim said.

“I’m happy to be going fast on a big kite again. There’s always room for improvement, but I'm really hopeful that if I race well tomorrow, I'll be in the gold fleet.”

No sailing was possible for Tom Saunders, George Gautrey, Luke Deegan and Caleb Armit in the ILCA 7 fleet, with little movement on the ILCA 6 leaderboard after two races for Greta Pilkington (59th) and Olivia Christie (72nd).

Isaac McHardie and Will McKenzie, and Logan Dunning Beck and Oscar Gunn start their finals series in the 49er tonight (NZ time), while Jo Aleh and Molly Meech will hope to continue their impressive form in the 49erFX.

Results and standings from day 4 at the 2023 Sailing World Championships in The Hague.

49er (83 boats) 
1st: Bart Lambriex/Floris Van De Werken (Ned) 1 4 (5) 2 1 1 3 5 2 - 19 points 
2nd: Diego Botin/Florian Trittel (Esp) 1 1 5 3 (24RDG) 6.8RDG 1 1 2 - 20.8 pts
3rd: Lukasz Przybytek/Jacek Piasecki (Pol) (17) 1 3 4 4 2 3 1 8 - 26 pts
8th: Isaac McHardie/Will McKenzie (NZ) 2 (15) 8 7 2 6 6 6 4 - 41 pts
13th: Logan Dunning Beck/Oscar Gunn (NZ) 2 (29UFD) 12 10 2 1 4 17 3 - 51 pts
48th: Campbell Stanton/William Shapland (NZ) 16 5 (26) 16 10 20 22 14 13 - 116 pts
67th: Sam Bacon/Cailen Rochford (NZ) 12 (29UFD) 18 16 15 7 29DNC 29DNC 29DNC - 155 pts

49erFX (59 boats)
1st: Vilma Bobeck/Rebecca Netzler (Swe) 2 (3) 1 1 1 1 1 3 1 - 11 pts
2nd: Isaura Maenhaut/Anouk Geurts (Bel) 2 2 1 (12) 6 1 4 8 2 - 26 pts
3rd: Olivia Price/Evie Haseldine (Aus) 1 4 2 3 2 5 3 (10) 9 - 29 pts
7th: Jo Aleh/Molly Meech (NZ) 4 7 3 (13) 5 2 12 1 10 - 44 pts
49th: Courtney Reynolds-Smith/Brianna Reynolds-Smith (NZ) 21 14 25 24 23 22 23 (28) 22 - 174 pts

Nacra 17 mixed (49 boats)
1st: Ruggero Tita/Caterina Banti (Ita) 1 1 1 2 1 1 1 1 1 9 (12) 5 - 24 pts
2nd: John Gimson/Anna Burnet (GBR) 3 2 2 3 3 1 3 5 5 1 (20) 4 - 32 pts
3rd: Emil Jarudd/Hanna Jonsson (Swe) 2 7 3 4 6 4 6 1 (17) 2 7 1 - 43 pts
8th: Micah Wilkinson/Erica Dawson (NZ) 5 (26UFD) 7 3 2 5 3 4 4 7 6 11 - 57 pts

470 mixed (64 boats)
1st: Keiju Okada/Miho Yoshioka (Jpn) 1 4 1 (6) 4 - 10 pts
2nd: Giacomo Ferrari/Bianca Caruso (Ita) 14 (15) 2 1 1 - 18 pts
3rd: Simon Diesch/Anna Markfort (Ger) (18) 9 1 5 3 - 18 pts
51st: Brittany Wornall/Sam Street (NZ) (29) 24 12 19 26 -81 pts
58th: Derek Scott/Rebecca Hume (NZ) 27 (28) 27 21 23 - 98 pts
62nd: Annabelle Rennie-Younger/Blake McGlashan (NZ) 26 32 (33RET) 25 24 - 107 pts

ILCA 7 (138 boats)
1st: Tonci Stipanovic (Cro) 1 1 - 2 pts
2nd: Michael Beckett (GBR) 3 1 - 4 pts
3rd: Pavlos Kontides (Cyp) 4 2 - 6 pts
16th: Tom Saunders (NZ) 10 13 - 23 pts
24th: George Gautrey (NZ) 15 16 - 31 pts
64th: Luke Deegan (NZ) 43 23 - 66 pts
99th: Caleb Armit (NZ) 39 56 - 95 pts

ILCA 6 (109 boats)
1st: Maria Erdi (Hun) 5 1 3 (7) - 9 pts
2nd: Carolina Albano (Ita) 4 2 4 (22) - 10 pts
3rd: Anne-Marie Rindom (Den) 2 (12) 8 3 -13 pts
59th: Greta Pilkington (NZ) 23 (46) 31 14 - 68 pts
72nd: Olivia Christie (NZ) 19 44 17 (55) - 80 pts

Men's windfoil (93 boards)
1st: Sebastian Kordel (Ger) 1.7RDG (3) 1 1 - 3.7 pts
2nd: Luuc Van Opzeeland (Ned) 1 (5) 1 3 - 5 pts
3rd: Thomas Goyard (Fra) 3 (9) 3 3 - 9 pts
29th: Josh Armit (NZ) 7 19 9 (31) - 35 pts
36th: Thomas Crook (NZ) 15 9 21 (51DNC) - 45 pts
44th: Eli Liefting (NZ) (51BFD) 11 27 15 - 53 pts
71st: Patrick Haybittle (NZ) (51BFD) 15 39 33 - 87 pts

Men's kitefoil (84 boards)
1st: Maximilian Maeder (SGP) 1 1 1 (2) - 3 pts
2nd: Toni Vodisek (Slo) 1 1 1 (3) - 3 pts
3rd: Riccardo Pianosi (Ita) 1 (4) 2 1 - 4 pts
27th: Lukas Walton-Keim (NZ) 9 6 8 (15) - 23 pts

Women's kitefoil (53 boards)
1st: Daniela Moroz (USA) 2STP 1 8 – 11 pts
2nd: Alina Kornelli (Aut) 4 9 3 - 16 pts
3rd: Maggie Eillen Pescetto (Ita) 3 7 7 - 17 pts
33rd: Justina Kitchen (NZ) 4 11 - 15 pts

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