2016 International 2.4mR World Championship - Megan Pascoe in action

by Peter Campbell on 9 Jan 2016 2016 International 2.4mR Class World Championships - Disabled British sailor Megan Pascoe has won the 2016 World Championship for the International 2.4mR single-handed yacht with two final races to sail today.

Pascoe (28) won both races seven and eight yesterday, relishing the light winds and benefitting from several significant changes in wind strength and direction of the past two days.

Yesterday’s two wins gave her three straight wins giving her a net score of 11 points after one discard and her first world championship victory in the 2.4mR class.

In second place, after a luckless day, is Tasmanian and Australian champion and Paralympic representative Matt Bugg who finished third and second in yesterday’s race after being overtaken when leading in both races. Bugg is on a net 30.

Rikard Bjurstrom (FIN) is third overall on 49 points with a two - three score, with New Zealander Paul Francis on 54 points (five - seven yesterday), closely followed by Athens and Sydney Paralympic representative Peter Thompson fifth overall on 59 points with a score four - eight yesterday.

Niko Salomaa (FIN) is in sixth position on 62 points while Tasmanian Stephen ‘Rowdy’ McCullum, who represented the RYCT at the 2015 Worlds in Finland, has the same net pointscore, yesterday placings six - four.

Pascoe is unbeatable going into today’s final two races from the Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania when two discard races apply.

The renowned British sailor is a position that even if Matt Bugg wins the last two races and she finishes last in each, she can discard these races and still finish well clear of Bugg.

“I’ve never before in front so many times in a regatta, only to get run over near the finish line,” Bugg said after yesterday’s racing. “I lost the last race to Megan by just seconds.

“Now I’m looking for a great run of good fortunate on the race track, including the Rio Paralympics,” added Bugg who is expected to be named in the team for Rio in next few weeks.

Pascoe is on the finest disabled women sailors, despite suffering from cerebral palsy. She saw this as no reason not to aspire to anything she felt drawn to in a sporty family where dinghy racing, windsurfing and triathlons were normal weekend activities.

Pascoe’s sharp and clear thinking has compensated for her undermined physical capability. The result is a highly focused, competitive woman whose single- minded confidence is born out of careful analysis rather than bone- headed stubbornness.

“I will be competing at the Paralympics; it just might not be this one,” she says with a confident and genuine smile.