ISAF Sailing Worlds - Belcher and Ryan lead ahead of medal race

by Cora Zillich on 20 Sep 2014 At the ISAF Sailing World Championships in Santander, Olympic champion Mat Belcher is just one step away from winning his fifth successive World Championship title in the 470 class, and if he succeeds it will mark his second title in partnership with Will Ryan.

Mat Belcher and Will Ryan looked strong on their last day of final series racing and move into Saturday’s double point top-ten medal race ranked first. The duo posted two race wins and one second in Friday’s three races and now has a strong 14.7 point lead over Croatian crew of Sime Fantela and Igor Marenic.

'The conditions were slightly lighter compared to what we had yesterday. They were less variable, we probably had the most stable conditions we had the whole week,' Belcher said about the conditions. 'We started really well and needed to have a good day. We knew that and we knew that yesterday (Thursday), but didn’t think we would get all the races in. Every race counts and the good thing about today was that we took a lot of confidence away. The day gave us a lot of confidence to know that we can get the result when we need to.'

Commenting on the potential for another World title on Saturday, Belcher continued, 'It is a pretty big deal. This year we have sailed really well and I am a firm believer that we deserve to be where we are. A lot can happen in a medal race and we have seen that before where we had an even bigger points gap, that at one stage we weren’t winning.'

Qualifying for the top ten medal race Belcher and Ryan also qualified the Men’s 470 boat class for Australia with 13 nation places up for grabs at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games – an important goal of this regatta as Belcher acknowledged

'It does mean a lot to secure the spot for Rio. I said to Will after today’s second race that it was a cool thing to qualify Australia for the Olympics and of course this was the main goal at this regatta. You just never know. '

Based on score mathematics, Australia has also secured the Rio 2016 spot in the 49er – Men’s Skiff after Olympic Gold medallists Nathan Outteridge and Iain Jensen moved into second on their penultimate day of gold fleet racing.

Mat Belcher and Will Ryan will race Australia’s second medal race on Saturday, 20 September 15:00 local time (23:00 AEST). Already on Thursday (18 September), Tom Burton (NSW) claimed Australia’s first medal of the ISAF Sailing World Championships – a silver in the Laser class.

The testing conditions experienced all week at the ISAF World Championships in Santander, prevailed on day eight of the regatta, but most members of the Australian Sailing Team ended the day in their strongest position of the championships thus far.

Two more races where sailed on Friday in the final series of the 49er - gold fleet and it was the best day for Olympic gold medallists Nathan Outteridge and Iain Jensen thus far at this Championship.

After finishing Thursday in overall third the duo was able to move into second on Friday after two strong races and posting a second and first in conditions of 18-27 knots.

They were also able to decrease the gap to the leading defending World Champions Peter Burling and Blair Tuke from New Zealand by a few points, but the Kiwis are 24 points ahead of the Aussies. As Iain Jensen points out this means chances are low to be able to pass them:

'We still have a long way to go towards the Kiwis points, but we are now in second, ahead of the Danish. We'll just go into tomorrow and just try and have another good race. The Kiwis are so far ahead that for us to catch them, they've got to make some big mistakes. So we'll just go out there and try and have a good race ourselves and maybe keep an eye on the Danish because they are close to us. We'll just focus on having a good start, good first work, all the normal things.'

The 49er Gold fleet will have one more race on Saturday before the medal race on Sunday, 21 September.

With Australian Sailing Squad’s David Gilmour (WA) and Rhys Mara (NSW) ranked tenth, chances are still there for two Australian crews to qualify for the medal race.

After limited and challenging racing opportunities since starting on Monday, the 49erFX fleet was finally able to finish their four qualifying series races on Thursday and got four final series races in on Friday.

After all three Australian crews qualified for the gold fleet it will be a close and tight battle for the medal race spots with Olympic gold medallist in the 470 class Tessa Parkinson (WA) and Chelsea Hall (WA) in overall 14th, Tess Lloyd (VIC) and Caitlin Elks (WA) in 15th, and London Olympic silver medallist Olivia Price (NSW) and Eliza Solly (VIC) in 16th.

They will have three races on Saturday and will have to get into the top ten to be able to qualify for Sunday’s medal race.

Australia is represented with a strong squad in the Nacra 17 with all four Australian crews qualifying for the gold fleet in the final series, which started on Friday. Four races were sailed and as Nacra coach Andrew Landenberger outlined, the positions during racing were a bit like 'Casino Royal'. Results kept changing a lot across the fleet as Darren Bundock (NSW) explained, 'I don't think anyone really dominated today. There were a couple of guys at the front of the fleet in one race and then at the back of the fleet in another race.'

About their results Bundock added: 'It was a very, very, tricky day, with the breeze out of the South-west. It was anywhere between 20 and seven knots and it wasn't such a good day for us. We didn't really get our head around what was going on out there. No matter which way we went, it seemed to be the wrong way. Sometimes we thought we were looking pretty good upwind, but when we reached the top mark the wind would change and we ended up not doing so well.'

It is the youngsters in the squad who are currently posting the most consistent results and after an overall nine races Jason Waterhouse (NSW) and Lisa Darmanin (NSW) are the highest ranked Australian boat. The two cousins had a race win and a second and moved up into overall fifth on the penultimate day of final series racing.

Olympic medallists Darren Bundock (NSW) and Nina Curtis (NSW) dropped one position into overall eighth with Pip Pietromonaco (VIC) and James Wierzbowski (VIC) following in 14th and Euan McNicol (NSW) and Lucinda Whitty (NSW) in 15th.

After missing out on some racing at the beginning of the week, the Nacra17 are back on schedule with three more races scheduled for Saturday. All Australian crews are still in a position to make the medal race on Sunday.

It was the second day of gold fleet racing for Australian Sailing Squad’s athletes Oliver Tweddell (VIC) and Jake Lilley (QLD) and they got two races in. With two races to go in a highly competitive fleet, Lilley sits in 13th and Tweddell in 23d.

Racing is scheduled to resume at 11:00 local time (17:00 AEST) on Saturday, 20 September 2014.

The Medal Race will be broadcast live on Fox Sports on Saturday, 20 September 2014 on Fox 1 from 11:30 p.m. - 1:45 a.m. and Fox 3: 1:30 a.m. - 3:30 a.m. AEST as well as via the ISAF YouTube channel. For further details see here.

2014 ISAF Sailing World Championships Australian Sailing Team and Squad Standings as of Thursday, 18th September 2014:

470M (Men’s Two Person Dinghy)
1st Mathew Belcher (QLD) and Will Ryan (QLD) – AST (6, 5, 4.3 RDG, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2)
22nd Alexander Conway and Patrick Conway (4, 10, 17, 17, 23, 18, 8, 29, 22)
34th Matt Crawford (NSW) and Rob Crawford (NSW) – ASS (34, 10, 15, 16, 22, 19, 32, 26, 34)
55th Angus Galloway (QLD) and Tim Hannah (NSW) – ASS (30, 13, 24, 22, 22, 28, 21, 7)

Olympic Qualifying: top 13 countries
Racing: 14-20 September

470W (Women's Two Person Dinghy)
26th Carrie Smith (WA) and Jaime Ryan (QLD) – ASS (8, 22, 5, 15, 28 RET, 23, 26, 12, 24, 27)
34th Sasha Ryan (QLD) and Amelia Catt (TAS) – ASS (13, 12, 15, 16, 5, 2, 18, 18)
50th Lucy Shepherd and Emma Barton (TAS - TIS) (24, 25, 25, 11, 14, 28 DNF, 25, 19)

49er (Men's Skiff – 49er)
2nd Nathan Outteridge (NSW) and Iain Jensen (NSW) – AST (16, 4, 9, 19, 1, 3, 1, 13, 3, 2, 1)
10th David Gilmour (WA) and Rhys Mara (NSW) – ASS (16, 3, 19, 4, 1, 19, 11, 5, 19, 17, 10)
26th Will Phillips (VIC) and Jasper (Fang) Warren (WA) – ASS (24, 16, 38, 15, 2, 1, 10, 5, 3, 13)
27th Steve Thomas (WA) and Sam Phillips (VIC) – ASS (31, 2, 33, 27, 14, 2, 5, 1, 1, 8)
42nd Joel Turner (QLD) and Lewis Brake (QLD) – ASS (20, 17, 23, 41UFD, 16, 29 DNF, 29 DNF, 6, 10, 3)

49erFX (Women's Skiff)
14th Tessa Parkinson and Chelsea Hall (13, 17, 22, 2, 3, 15, 12, 23, 7)
15th Tess Lloyd (VIC/ASS) and Caitlin Elks (WA/AST) – (13, 8, 6, 7, 5, 19, 2, 24, 22)
16th Olivia Price (NSW/AST) and Eliza Solly (VIC/ASS) – (29 BFD, 18, 12, 7, 7, 3, 22, 1, 14)

Olympic Qualifying: top 10 countries
Racing: 15-21 September

Nacra17 (Mixed Multihull)
5th Jason Waterhouse (NSW) and Lisa Darmanin (NSW) – AST (6, 9, 7, 9, 6, 10, 10, 1, 2)
8th Darren Bundock (NSW) and Nina Curtis (NSW) – AST (8, 6, 5, 5, 2, 6, 18, 11, 18)
14th Pip Pietromonaco (VIC) and James Wierzbowski (VIC) – ASS (5, 11, 10, 12, 6, 5, 12, 5, 10)
15th Euan McNicol (NSW/ASS) and Lucinda Whitty (NSW/AST) – (21, 13, 4, 10, 16, 4, 6, 8, 33)

Olympic Qualifying: top 10 countries
Racing: 15-21 September

Finn (Men's One Person Dinghy – Heavyweight)
13th Jake Lilley (QLD) – ASS (6, 40 DNF, 5, 4, 15, 13, 12, 22)
23rd Oliver Tweddell (VIC) – ASS (1, 9, 7, 22, 31, 4, 25)
72nd Joe McMillan (NSW) – Non AST/ASS (29, 32, 36, 34, 33, 31, 29, 29)

Olympic Qualifying: top 12 countries
Racing: 15-21 September

RS:X (Women's Windsurfer) – Final Results
36th Joanna Sterling (QLD) – ASS (12, 18, 23, 17, 23, 7, 11, 8, 3)

Olympic Qualifying: top 13 countries
Racing: 13-19 September

Laser (Men's One Person Dinghy) – Final Results
1st Tom Burton (NSW) – AST (5, 3, 8, 2, 8, 4, 6, 7, 14)
17th Ashley Brunning (NSW) – ASS (11, 30, 50 BFD, 1, 14, 10, 15, 14)
18th Ryan Palk (QLD) – ASS (5, 9, 13, 1, 27, 26, 46, 22)
19th Luke Elliott (WA) – ASS (20, 3, 15, 27, 26, 7, 28, 9)
28th Matthew Wearn (WA) – AST (7, 2, 10, 29, 35, 38, 40, 1)
51st Mitchell Kennedy (QLD) – ASS (21, 8, 17, 18, 4)
61st Jeremy O’Connell (VIC) – ASS (43, 5, 17, 31, 9)

Olympic Qualifying: top 13 countries – AUS Qualified

Laser Radial (Women's One Person Dinghy) – Final Results
39th Krystal Weir (VIC) – ASS (43, 22, 13, 25, 55, 15.5, 20)
72nd Anna Philip (VIC) – Youth Bridging (23, 25, 47, 30)
110th Ashley Stoddart (QLD) – ASS (49, 46, 46, Australian Sailing
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