Delta Lloyd Regatta 2011 Team Maclaren take Bronze medal

by Anna Tunnicliffe on 30 May 2011 Delta Lloyds Regatta 2011 petit-finals update from Anna Tunnicliffe of Team Maclaren.

Team Maclaren won the Bronze medal at the 2011 Delta Lloyd Regatta. We swept the petit-finals 2-0 over Team Wang from China this morning in a shifty, puffy two races.

We awoke this morning expecting very windy conditions given yesterday's forecast, but were pleasently surprised to find 12-17kts on the course. We headed out for a 10:30 start.

The first race was pretty uneventful after we forced them over the line early. Race two was a little closer. We started to windward of them heading out to the left. We fought a few knocks before we had to tack away. By now, port was the long tack and we were to leeward slightly bow out. As we headed up the course, we started to get a right angle and managed to tack back at them and get across them. We controlled them into the top mark and rounded a length ahead. Shortly after the rounding, I slipped and dropped the tiller causing us to round up and broach. The Chinese team gybed away while we got back under control. We caught a nice puff downwind and managed to catch back up to them. They gybed to windward of us which allowed us to control them into the bottom mark. We opened our lead upwind to a couple of lengths and went on to finish with the win and the bronze medal.

We are happy with how we sailed today. The team did a great job with the conditions. Next we head to Weymouth for some training before the next leg of the http://www.sailing.org/worldcup/home.php!ISAF_World_Cup, the http://www.skandiasailforgoldregatta.co.uk/!Sail_for_Gold_regatta which starts June 5th.

We would very much like to thank our Title Sponsor, Maclaren, our Gold Level Sponsors 11th Hour Racing and Laser Performance, and our Bronze Level Sponsors Carmeuse, Trinity Yachts, and Chicago Match Race Center for their continued support of our campaign for the 2012 Olympic Games. We would also like to thank US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics(USSTAG) and its sponsors for their continued support. Also, thank you to our private donors. Please remember that any and all donations/contributions to our campaign should be made payable directly to either The Sailing Foundation of New York (tax deductible) memo'd Anna Tunnicliffe, or to Anna Tunnicliffe.

Sail Hard,

Anna
Team Maclaren