Argentine continues Laser World form in Qingdao

by Rob Kothe on 12 Aug 2008 Argentina's Julio Alsogaray cleared out from the 43 boat Laser fleet in the first race of the 2008 Beijing Olympic sailing regatta sailed in Qingdao today.

Alsogaray, who was second in the 2008 Laser World Championship sailed in Australia last February, gave the fleet a light weather sailing lesson.

The race started in a six knot south easterly. Alsogaray picked the shift perfectly to lead at the first mark and extended though the race. Andrew Murdoch (NZL) was second at the first mark and held that place to the finish line, crossing 40 seconds behind the winner.

Chile’s Matias Del Solar was third. Britains Paul Goodison considered to be amongst the best light weather sailors in the fleet finished 15th and 2007 and 2008 World Champion Tom Slingsby who was a shattering 35th at the top of the first beat climbed back to 21st overall.

1	ARG	Julio Alsogaray	1
2	NZL	Andrew Murdoch	2
3	CHI	Matias Del Solar	3
4	TUR	Kemal Muslubas	4
5	POR	Gustavo Lima	5
6	ITA	Diana Daniela Raponi	6
7	SWE	Rasmus Myrgren	7
8	CYP	Pavlos Kontides	8
9	POL	Maciej Grabowski	9
10	NOR	Kristian Ruth	10
11	RUS	Igor Lisovenko	11
12	URU	Alejandro Foglia	12
13	CAN	Michael Leigh	13
14	USA	Andrew Campbell	14
15	GBR	Paul Goodison	15
16	EST	Deniss Karpak	16
17	ESP	Javier Hernandez	17
18	DEN	Anders Nyholm	18
19	FRA	Jean Baptiste Bernaz	19
20	ISV	Thomas Barrows	20
21	AUS	Tom Slingsby	21
22	GRE	Evangelos Chimonas	22
23	KOR	Jeemin Ha	23
24	SLO	Vasilij Zbogar	24
25	FIN	Pierre Angelo Collura	25
26	CRO	Luka Radelic	26
27	HUN	Zsombor Berecz	27
28	AUT	Andreas Geritzer	28
29	CZE	Martin Trcka	29
30	LUX	Marc Schmit	30
31	BRA	Bruno Fontes	31
32	NED	Rutger van Schardenburg	32
33	SEY	Allan Julie	33
34	SUI	Christoph Bottoni	34
35	SIN	Seng Leong Koh	35
36	JPN	Yoichi Iijima	36
37	DOM	Raul Aguayo	37
38	UAE	Mohammad Adil Khalid	38
39	VEN	Jose Miguel Ruiz	39
40	CHN	Sheng Shen	40
41	BAR	Gregory Douglas	41
42	MAS	Kevin Lim	44
			BFD