The Australian Yngling crew of Krystal Weir, Karyn Gojnich and Angela Farrell opened the racing series with an very impressive win. After rounding the first mark in 7th place the team turned on their turbo speed overtaking boats on every leg.

The skies were sunny over Qingdao today with high temperatures and humidity making it uncomfortable just walking about the boat park. The wind blew 6 knots first thing but lightened off to 3.5 to 4.5 knots as the day went on. The start of the second race was delayed as the Race Officer waited to see if the breeze would hold.

The lightening winds made the strengthening tide the critical factor. The Australian Yngling team arrived at the top mark within the top 3 but due to a drop in windspeed their layline call was wrong as the tide pushed them away from the mark. This allowed boats behind to tack underneath them and round the mark in front. The team still had great speed and caught up to finish in 11th. They are sitting in 5th overall with 12 points.

The top three in the Yngling Class are; Great Britain in 1st with 5 points, Canada in 2nd with 9 points and just one point behind in 3rd is The Netherlands.

“We’re really pleased and we couldn’t ask for anything more,” said Karyn Gojnich.

“I’m very happy with our boat speed and there’s absolutely nothing that we need to change.”

Australia’s Finn representative, Anthony Nossiter, finished 11th and 22nd in today’s races and sits in 18th position overall with 33 points at the end of day one. 

There were massive position changes during the race that even sailing legend, Ben Ainslie couldn’t escape when he fell from 1st to 10th on the final downwind leg of the first race. At the top of the Finn leader board is Poland with 5 points, followed by USA in second with 7 points and Great Britain in third with 11 points.

Australian Sailing Team Director Michael Jones, who was on the Yngling course today, said it is good to get the first races out of the way.

“Everyone on the team has been itching to get this competition started and, with the first races complete for two classes, it’s like the seal has been broken and we can all just get on with it now,” said Jones.

“It’s good to have a race win already, especially in these changing conditions, but there’s a long way to go and a lot of races to be run yet, so we need to keep level heads and deal with each day and each race as they come.”

Racing Tomorrow – Sunday 10 August:

The 49er class will begin competing tomorrow. Australia’s Nathan Outteridge and Ben Austin are the current World Champions and have been in great form during pre-event training races in Qingdao.  
 
Australian Sailing Team insights:
 
Most influential person in your career?
 
“Lex Bertrand taught me how to step out of my comfort zone, push myself and to do things that might seem a little crazy.” - Krystal Weir, Yngling

Australian Sailing Team

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Last Updated ( Saturday, 09 August 2008 )