With a four-point advantage over Azzurra, Ran is currently leading at the Gaastra 52 World Championship in Miami. Everything is still possible tomorrow, with three more races to go.
Azzurra - Photo by Ingrid Abery/Azzurra
Three challenging and spectacular races were held today off Miami Beach and the TP52 race course was positioned right in front of Ocean Drive, the famous boulevard that runs alongside the equally famous South Beach, already crowded with beachgoers.
The breeze was light, 9 to 11 knots, and particularly shifty with sudden changes in direction of up to 30º, a true puzzle for tacticians and strategists. Azzurra scored a second, a fifth and a third and avoided slippages to the bottom of the fleet, as happened to other boats: Gladiator won the first race, finished third in the second one, only to come dead last in the third race. Quantum had a third and a fourth but then slipped to sixth, a result that would prove a drag in the score table.
Saturday, March 9th, is the final day of the event and three races are scheduled. Starting time has been brought forward by one hour to 11:30am local time, 5:30pm Italian time.
Quotes of the day
Guille Parada, skipper: “It was a tough day with very unstable wind conditions both in terms of speed and direction. We didn’t sail at the level I think we are able to do and we are now placed second overall. We still have another three races and I think we have a chance in winning. We are going to fight until the end and we will try to make life as tough as we can for Ran.”
Vasco Vascotto, tactician: “Today was another very complicated day in terms of tactics. We sailed well but on Ran they were better than us and they deserve being in front. The Worlds haven’t finished yet and we have to fight because we are convinced we still have some aces up our sleeves. Tomorrow we need to sail three perfect races because in the World Championship a second place isn’t worth much. However, at the same time, we need to keep an eye on the overall leaderboard of the 52 Super Series because that’s the goal of the season.”
Gaastra 52 World Championships, Results after 7 races.
1 Rán Racing (Zennström, SWE) 17pts (7,1,1,1,4,2,1)
2 Azzurra (Roemmers, ITA) 21 pts (1,2,3,5,2,5,3)
3 Quantum Racing (DeVos, USA) 25pts (3,4,2,3,3,4,6)
4 Gladiator (Langley, GBR) 29pts (2,6,5,4,1,3,8)
5 Vesper (Swartz, USA) 30pts (5,5,7,2,6,1,4)
6 Interlodge (Fragomen, USA) 37pts (4,7,4,7,5,8,2)
7 Gaastra-Pro (Blees, NED) 46pts (6,8,6,8,7,6,5)
8 Rio (Moshayedi, USA) 47pts (8,3,8,6,8,7,7)
