ISAF Sailing Worlds - Belcher writes sailing history in Santander

by Cora Zillich on 21 Sep 2014 Olympic champion Mat Belcher (QLD) and Will Ryan (QLD) have won the 2014 ISAF Sailing World Championship in the Men’s 470 -- the Men’s Two Person Dinghy on the penultimate day of the regatta (Saturday, 20 September).

This is Australia’s second medal at these World Championships after Tom Burton (NSW) claimed Australia’s first medal of the ISAF Sailing World Championships – a silver in the Laser class on Thursday (18 September).

The spectator Dune was packed with 2,500 to 3,000 sailing fans who watched Belcher and Ryan claim their second title together. For the World Sailor of the year Belcher the victory was special as he made it five 470 world titles in a row.

Celebrating his 32nd Birthday on Saturday, Belcher gave himself one of his most memorable presents by becoming the only sailor in 470 history to win five successive World Championship titles.

'This is amazing and really, really cool. Now I can really celebrate. It’s just a shame that my son and my wife can’t be here, but I’ll see them tomorrow' said Belcher after racing.

'We had a lot of pressure coming into the event, coming in as world number one and we are really happy to come away with a win. The conditions have been very difficult this week and I’m happy how we performed.'

The gold medal was well within their grasp going into the Medal Race for defending World Champions Mat Belcher and Will Ryan. In theory, Croatia's Sime Fantela and Igor Marenic could claim gold, but in practice the Croatians needed to win the Medal Race with the Aussies ninth or worse in the ten boat fleet.

The reigning 470 Junior World Champions Jordi Xammar and Joan Herp won the Medal Race in front of a home crowd, including the Spanish President.

Belcher and Ryan finished the medal race in fourth place and successfully secured their second World Championship title together. By qualifying for the top ten medal race Belcher and Ryan already qualified the Men’s 470 boat class for Australia on Friday with 13 nation places up for grabs at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.

'This means a lot. You have to be able to qualify your country and for us to tick that off here gives us a lot of confidence. Winning the World Champs last year and backing that up with the win this year is a big step in our relationship. We work hard and we’re really looking forward to racing in Rio and to be as good as we can be,' Belcher said about the Olympic qualification and the road ahead.

'To win here is important for us and our partnership. It’s is important to know in a pressured situation that we can perform and we really stepped it up as a team this week, which I’m proud of. So I guess coming into Rio, we’re ticking all the right boxes and we’re pretty happy on how we are developing.'

About Australian Sailing Team’s head coach Victor Kovalenko, OAM, who added the 17th World Champion title to his long list of accolades Belcher added: 'He’s known as the ‘medal maker’ and gives us a lot of confidence. Yeah, we have a good guy following us in the motor boat.'

After already qualifying the Laser earlier in the week, on the penultimate day of the World Championships, Australia also secured a spot at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games in the 49er, 49er FX, Nacra 17 and Finn classes. This brings the total Olympic class spots secured for Australia at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games to six.

On Sunday (21 September), the final World Championships day, Australia will be represented in the 49er and Nacra17 medal races.

Olympic Champions Nathan Outteridge (NSW) and Iain Jensen (NSW) did not have the best day and are now ranked third and two points behind the second ranked Danish going into the final medal race.

Australian Sailing Squad’s David Gilmour (WA) and Rhys Mara (VIC) were the second Australian crew qualifying for the top ten medal race by finishing ninth overall after the final series. It is the first time in a long time that Australia will have two boats in the medal race.

Helm David Gilmour was thrilled to post a performance that qualifies him for the Australian Sailing Team: 'The Australian Sailing Team is the pinnacle in Australia to qualify for and it's extremely difficult. We're stoked to have made it into the team.'

Jason Waterhouse (NSW) and Lisa Darmanin (NSW) have had a strong regatta and after another good day the duo will go into Sunday’s medal race as the highest ranked Australian crew in third place, just one point behind the second placed Italian crew.

'We want to get the silver, but we can’t get too greedy and need to keep an eye on everyone else too', Jason Waterhouse said about the task at hand.

Olympic medallists Darren Bundock (NSW) and Nina Curtis (NSW) kept their eight position and will be the second Australian crew in the medal race.

It was a tight battle for the ten medal race spots and in the end Tess Lloyd (VIC) and Caitilin Elks (WA) finished in eleventh with Olivia Price (NSW) and Eliza Solly (VIC) in 14th.

Nevertheless, Australia was ranked within the top ten nations and thus secured the 49erFX spot for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.

Queenslander Jake Lilley just missed out of the top ten medal race by finishing 13th after the Finn fleet was not able to race today due to lack of wind on their course. Nevertheless Lilley’s performance secured Australia a spot at the Rio 2016 Games in the Finn class as Australia was ranked tenth nation.

The Medal Races will be broadcast live on Fox Sports on Monday, September 2014 on Fox1 1:30 a.m. - 3:30 a.m. AEST as well as via the ISAF YouTube channel. For further details see below and here

Schedule of Medal Racing – Sunday 21st :
49er 13:10 hrs and Nacra 15:10 hrs

2014 ISAF Sailing World Championships Australian Sailing Team & Squad Standings as of Saturday, 20 September 2014:

470M (Men’s Two Person Dinghy) – Final Results
1st Mathew Belcher (QLD) and Will Ryan (QLD) – AST (6, 5, 4.3 RDG, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 4)
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 – AUS qualified
Men’s 470 Results

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, 25)
9th David Gilmour (WA) and Rhys Mara (NSW) – ASS (16, 3, 19, 4, 1, 19, 11, 5, 19, 17, 10, 3)
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)

Olympic Qualifying: top 10 countries – AUS qualified

49erFX (Women's Skiff)
11th Tess Lloyd (VIC/ASS) and Caitlin Elks (WA/AST) – (13, 8, 6, 7, 5, 19, 2, 24, 22, 14, 7, 11)
14th Olivia Price (NSW/AST) and Eliza Solly (VIC/ASS) – (29 BFD, 18, 12, 7, 7, 3, 22, 1, 14, 10, 10, 15)
21st Tessa Parkinson and Chelsea Hall (13, 17, 22, 2, 3, 15, 12, 23, 7, 25, 26 DSQ, 18)

Olympic Qualifying: top 10 countries – AUS qualified

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, 7)
12th Euan McNicol (NSW/ASS) and Lucinda Whitty (NSW/AST) – (21, 13, 4, 10, 16, 4, 6, 8, 33, 3)
21st Pip Pietromonaco (VIC) and James Wierzbowski (VIC) – ASS (5, 11, 10, 12, 6, 5, 12, 5, 20 SCP, 27)

Olympic Qualifying: top 10 countries – AUS qualified
Racing: 15-21 September

Finn (Men's One Person Dinghy – Heavyweight) – Final Results
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 – AUS qualified
Racing: 15-21 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, 53)

470W (Women's Two Person Dinghy) – Final Results
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)

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 Australian Sailing
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