ISAF Women’s Match Racing World Championships - Through to next stage

by Craig Heydon on 28 Jun 2012 The Australian Women’s Match Racing team of Olivia Price, Nina Curtis and Lucinda Whitty won their way through to the next stage of racing at the 2012 ISAF Women’s Match Racing World Championship in Gottenburg, Sweden.

The trio finished third in their group with five wins and two losses from the opening round robin.

After being unbeaten on day one Price and crew finished off the round robin on Wednesday with a win against American Sally Barkow and losses against Russian sailor Ekaterina Skudina and American Anna Tunnicliffe.

'So far we're very happy with our qualifying round robin results finishing third overall in the group,' said Price. 'We had some tough races today, and even though we made some mistakes we were still able to create opportunities and apply pressure during all three races.

'The racing today was very close, especially in our race against Sally Barkow, where we took the lead at the second top mark after applying pressure upwind the final time,' she said.

'We were in a gybing dual down the last run, and we took the win by less than a boat length. 'Our races today were the toughest ones we’ve had this regatta, and our race with Anna Tunnicliffe included the whole package of racing, with us being over at the start line, a penalty given to her, then one to us, and resulted in three lead changes,' she said.

Price, Curtis, Whitty and their gold round robin competitors will spend Thursday off the water while the crews who finished in the bottom half of their groups race to decide positions nine through 16. On Friday the top eight crews will be back in action, taking part in a full round robin.

The Australians will race their seven opponents once each with the top four crews to qualify for the semi-finals.

Results here

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