Tornado Champs Black Flagged in Princess Sofia Regatta

by Darren Bundock on 16 Apr 2003 Today we had rain showers and a building land breeze. The first race started in 12 knots and built to 25 by the end of the last race. The breeze veered right all day.
Race1 12 knots, Race2 15knots, Race3 20knots
Race4 20-25knots

Race 1 was won by the Russians as 14 boats were OCS (early start) on the black flag.

Unfortunately we were one of them again. A famous coach once said to me that your not trying if you dont get at least one OCS each regatta. Well coach we are trying but will take it easy from now on. We found ourselfs in abunch at the start and the 3 above us and the 2 below were OCS as well.

Race 2 we had a good fight with the first 5 boats to steal the lead at the last windward mark to hold to the finish.

Race 3 the Dutch showed there previous domination in the breezey conditions with Sven Karsenburg taking the lead on the 2nd down wind and increasing his lead until the finish.

Race 4 the breeze had really kicked in and we sailed extremely well and with some perect laylines we ran away to a comfortable win from Mitch Booth and Herbert Derkson.

We are currently 9th overall carrying the 57 point penalty for the early start, however with one more race we can discard our worst race and hopefully join the leaders at the top of the score sheet.'

1.NED Booth 6,2,4,2 (14)

2.FRA Backes 3,14,3,5 (25)

3.ESP Eckavari 2,13,7,4 (26)

4.GBR McMillian 13,3,8,3 (27)

5.GBR Styles 14,6,2,6 (28)

6.FRA Guilchard 7,11,9,7 (34)

7.DEN Ronholt 4,12,29,10 (45)

8.GER Landenburger 15,7,11,18 (51)

9.AUS Bundock/Ashby BFG,1,6,1 (65)

10.GER Nils 12,20,21,16 (69)

www.aussailing.com.au/darrenbundock

Sponsored by:Marinepool, FSE Robline, Subaru-All Wheel Drive, Ronstan, Tacktick, Ullman Eye Wear.

Supported by: Australian Yachting Federation, Australian Institute of Sport, NSWIS, AOC & VSaW.