Laser Radial Mens World Championship 2012 – Send some wind

by Rob Kothe and the Sail-World Team on 13 Jul 2012 Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron, in Manly, Brisbane is once again the venue for a Laser Class World Championship, the third in the last four months, with the Laser Masters Worlds in March and the Laser Radial Youths last week .

There are just 54 sailors from nine countries at 2012 Laser Radial Mens World Championship, which will run from July 11-17th – a disappointing roll up, blamed by most observers on the International Laser Class Association’s very regrettable tardiness in publishing NOR and opening online entries.

While most class world titles are online 12 months in advance, not so this event, the ILCA only managed to open the online entry doors a month before the Youth Worlds and six weeks before the Mens World Championships.

For Laser sailors to make vacation commitments and booking airline tickets to fly half way around the world with that lack of confirmation of the event and administrative support from the ILCA is just too difficult.

Regrettably we understand that many sailors who had planned to come to this event cancelled because of the uncertainty.

However, the expectation is that new President Tracey Usher, who enjoyed the Laser Master Worlds at this same Australian venue back in March, will make sure the ILCA, going forward focuses on the fundamentals of Class administration.

Now, back to the racing… or in this case lack of it. Another winter high has camped over inland Australia. The Practice Race Day and Race Day One were breeze free and this morning Principal Race Officer Kevin Wilson said ‘Please send wind!! We have a line of heavy cloud on the Brisbane city shoreline and off Moreton Bay and to the north, there is just grey cloud stretching to the horizon.

‘Right now we have just one knot in the harbour and I am about to signal an AP shore, I am hopeful it will pick up today tho'.

'This morning I said to the fleet, the forecast ahead is for good winds in the coming days, so we just have to be patient, and then we may sail up to four races per day.’

www.rqys.com.au