NZL 49er prepares for World Championships in Croatia

Mistral breeze pumping in Hyeres Peter Burling and Blair Tuke

2 x NZL boats in Zadar. Marcus and Josh putting their mast back up after measurement © Peter Burling and Blair Tuke

Our first regatta in Hyeres, France was a short windy event. We only sailed 2 ½ days out of the scheduled 6 - the Mistral breeze came in a bit too strong. Only 9 out of 16 49er races were completed.
Finishing 13th overall in France was a little disappointing but we are excited to race again in only a few days time.

We had the other kiwi boys Marcus and Josh with us for the 1300km drive from France to Croatia. A small detour through Monaco had us driving on the streets, towing a trailer, where the F1s will race in a few weeks. We also spent a couple of hours in Venice which was cool - definitely made a bit of fun out of the drive.

Zadar, our Worlds regatta venue in Croatia is nice and warm , around 26 deg C in the afternoon with light winds predicted for most of the regatta - will be another chance to tick off conditions that we don’t race in often.
The Worlds regatta is six days - first three days are the qualifying series – sailed in three fleets (nine races) and then we break to Gold (top 25 boats), Silver and Bronze.

Competition will be intense especially so with the last five Olympic 49er slots up for grabs at this regatta for those countries that have not yet qualified. 80 boats have entered.

The Worlds regatta web site is … http://www.49erworlds.org/

We fly home from Croatia for 14 days while our kiwi mates tow the 49er boats up to Weymouth ready for the Sail-for-Gold regatta in Weymouth at the Olympic venue – our last warm up regatta before the games.

Here is video of us in the Hyeres breeze

Peter Burling and Blair Tuke are supported by ... © Peter Burling and Blair Tuke