International Yngling World Championship - Tied at the top

by Peter Campbell on 7 Jan 2012 International Yngling World Championship, conducted by the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron, is being held in Sydney, Australia from 2nd to 8th January 2012. Defending World champion Maarten Jamin from The Netherlands and Australian champion Michael Nash are equal on points going into tomorrow’s final two races.

However, the Australia versus The Netherlands contest is not limited to these two skippers. Australia’s Hamish Jarrett is a close third, six points back and just one point ahead of Tom Otte, from The Netherlands. Any one of these four could end up the 2012 World champion in this one-design keelboat class fleet of 45 boats.

RSYS race officers today held three races in a freshening north-easterly breeze that averaged 15-18 knots, gusting to 22 knots. In fact, eight boats did not finish the final race which did not end until after 5.30pm with the strong sea breeze at its peak.

Jamin (NED) went into today’s racing in second place overall, Nash (AUS) in third place behind Hamish Jarrett (AUS) and both ended up equal on 30 points after one discard race. Jarrett slipped back to third overall.

Jamin, a dual World champion and catalyst for Yngling sailing in Holland, started the day in heat six with a second, but then had two eighth place, with Nash winning the opening race but then slipping to an 11th place in heat six. The Australian recovered well to tie the series with a third place in the final race of the day, heat eight.

Jarrett had a disappointing day, placing 11-9-7 to slip to third overall in the world championship, but on 36 points he is still within a chance of becoming World champion, as is Tom Otte (NED), another dual World champion. Otte sailed particularly well today, with a 4-1-9 result in the three heats and is on 37 points going into the final day.

Only four points behind Otte on 41 points is the young Dutch sailor Anne-Christianne Kentgens, who continued her consistent sailing with 6-6-10 score today to be fifth overall.

The belated improver today was Australian Neville Wittey, a former Olympic and two times Yngling World champion. He began day four of sailing by being black-flagged in heat six, but then notched up a third and a second which lifted him from 17th place overall to 10th overall.

Another local sailor, Matt Whitnall, also moved from eleventh to eighth in standings with 3-2-11 result today while Danish yachtsman Lucas Lier won the last race of the day to lift from ninth to seventh overall.

1. Maarten Jamin (NED) 4-6-1-1-(12)-2-8-8, 30 pts
1. Michael Nash (AUS) 2-3-4-6-(13)-1-11-3, 30 pts
3. Hamish Jarrett (AUS), 1-8-7-3-1-(11)-9-7, 36 pts
4. Tom Otte (NED) 5-4-6-(11)-8-4-1-9, 37 pts
5. Anne-Christianne Kentgens (NED) 3-12-2-(21)-2-6-6-10, 41 pts
6. Mikkel Winston (DEN) 13-5-3-15-(16)-5-14-6, 61 pts
7. Lucas Lier (DEN) 8-2-12-13-(15)-14-13-1, 63 pts
8. Matt Whitnall (AUS) 10-19-(20)-16-10-3-2-11, 71 pts
9. JP van de Meeren (NED) 7-10-11-10-(22)-7-7-20, 72 pts
10. Neville Whitty (AUS) 9-7-27-9-23 (44bfd)-3-2, 80 Yngling World Championship website