Ciudad de Santader Trophy - Champions have been crowned

by Helena de la Gándara on 16 Sep 2013 Following a week of steady racing the medallists at the Ciudad de Santander Trophy, the test event for the Santander 2014 ISAF Sailing World Championships, the winners have been determined.

With a day of Medal Races planned on the Foxtrot area, close to the CEAR High Performance Centre, the breeze never quite settled forcing abandonment at 16:30.

In the Nacra 17 fleet, Austria's Thomas Zajac and Tanja Frank had a flyer on the penultimate day taking double bullets. This meant that they came into the final day tied on 20 points with Great Britain's Ben Saxton and Hannah Diamond with a near identical scoreline. The only difference was the discard.

With no racing on the final day the Austrians took gold having won the last race of the regatta and Zajac was disappointed that the wind failed to come in, 'If we had fair conditions it would have been fun to race because for us this is also a test event and it’s always good to go into the Medal Race as leader and try to keep space but today it was really shifty. It was fair and good that we did not start today.

'Sailing was tough this week but it’s for everyone. We were a little bit disappointed the day before yesterday that’s why we went out and kicked it and somehow it worked out with two race wins.'

Saxton and Diamond had to settle for silver whilst Rupert White and Nicola Boniface (GBR) took bronze.

In Men’s RS:X action, Dorian van Rijsselberghe sailed strong all week and with a 13 point lead heading into the final day a lot of hard work had been done. The Dutchman was disappointed not to finish things on the race course, 'A day not raced is a day not lived. If there’s wind there’s wind but if not you’ve got to make the best of it but we didn’t race. It’s been pretty good here and experienced all the courses. It’s been very challenging with a lot of current and a lot of difference in wind.

'It’s great, it’s not a one way track and keeps the racing exciting.'

Julien Bontemps (FRA) took silver whilst Nick Dempsey settled for bronze.

Charline Picon (FRA) got off to a flyer at the start of the week in the Women's RS:X with three straight bullets. This set her up for a 12 point victory over Great Britain's Bryony Shaw who takes silver and Spain's Bryony Shaw who picks up bronze.

Diego Botin and Pablo Turrado (ESP) took five of 15 victories throughout the week in the 49er to pick up a deserved gold. Coming through in second is Fred Strammer and Zachary Brown (USA) with the Japanese in third.

In Laser Radial, Manami Doi (JPN) fended off a penultimate day attack from Turkey's Cagla Donertas which saw the Turkish sailor pick up two bullets and an eighth. Consistency was key for Doi and kept the Turkish charge at bay on the penultimate day with 4-2-3 scoreline.

Doi came into the final day with a seven point lead over Donertas ensuring a Japanese gold and a Turkish silver. Great Britain’s Chloe Martin completed the podium.

Jesper Stalheim (SWE) and Juan Ignacio Maegli (GUA) ended the week tied on 19 points in the Laser. Both sailors won one race apiece but the Swede recorded four second place finishes to Maegli’s two ensuring he picked up gold.

It would have been a winner takes all Medal Race between the Swede, Guatemalan and Nick Thompson (GBR) who was just two points behind them but it was not to be as the wind failed to materialise.

Japan’s Chika Hatae and Noriko Okuma were the sole entrants in the 49erFX using the week to gain experience in the 49erFX for the first time outside of Japan ahead of the 49erFX World Championship in Marseille, France in a few days’ time.

With racing over and the testing done organisers have a full year to complete their preparations and put systems in place to welcome over 1,000 sailors across ten Olympic events in Santander 2014