ISAF Sailing World Championships - US Women Match Racers take title

by Dana Paxton on 17 Dec 2011 Perth 2011 ISAF Sailing World Championships - Women's Match Racing final between US's Anna Tunnicliffe and GBR's Lucy MacGregor took place on Fremantle’s Inner Harbour in front of a large crowd of spectators lining the sea wall.

Anna Tunnicliffe’s Team Maclaren of Molly Vandemoer and Debbie Capozzi won the Women’s Match Racing final after defeating Lucy MacGregor in four straight matches.

'We’re really excited right now,' said Tunnicliffe moments after getting onshore from the racecourse.

'It’s amazing, we’ve put a lot of effort into this year and had a lot of big events we had to get through and this has really topped off all our hard training,' Tunnicliffe said. 'The team sailed really well, it was tricky conditions, conditions that we actually thought we were weakest in so we’re psyched we came out on top.'

This is the first match racing World Championship title for Tunnicliffe, Vandemoer and Capozzi as a team, although Capozzi won the Worlds three times previous with another team. Tunnicliffe and Vandemoer teamed up to win the Snipe Women’s World championship.

Mark Medelblatt (Miami, Fla.) and Brian Fatih (Miami, Fla.) scored their first double digit result in race 10, a 10th, but will drop that result in their scoreline. They add an eighth in race nine to hold the second placed overall behind Robert Scheidt and Bruno Prada (BRA). Mendelblatt and Fatih are the only US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics team to qualify for the medal race. George Szabo (San Diego, Calif.) and Mark Strube (Punta Gorda, Fla.) finished in 11th overeall, just 10 points out of the top 10.

In the 49ers, Erik Storck (Huntington, N.Y.) and Trevor Moore (North Pomfret, Vt./Naples, Fla.) climbed back into fifth overall after scoring 9-6-3. The high-performance skiff class will have three races on Saturday before Sunday’s medal race.

Racing continues on Saturday in the Laser, Men’s RS:X, and Women’s 470. The Star medal race takes place and will be carried live on the event’s website.

World Championship racing in the Women’s RS:X, Laser Radial, Men’s 470 and Finn classes were completed on December 11. The Olympic Trials Tracker has been updated showing final points for all American competitors in those classes.

To follow the live blog from event organizers and link to live tracking, please visit the event website. For class results click US Sailing Team website