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One Metre Worlds at West Kirby Sailing Club - Overall

by Tony Edwards 16 Jun 2011 06:14 PDT 28 May - 4 June 2011

Peter Stollery wins 2011 International One Metre World Championship

The 9th IOM World Championship held on the Marine Lake and magnificently hosted by West Kirby Sailing Club concluded on the 4th June in remarkable fashion. In all 25 races (125 heats) were sailed allowing 4 discardable scores for the series. During the week competitors were challenged with good length windward/leeward courses, winds from a range of directions, strong through to light, heavy rain and cold conditions improving to bright sunshine and a glorious day midweek for a visit by MYA Patron HRH Prince Phillip just prior to his 90th. The destiny of the Championship swayed back and forth as the top group of 76 competitors emerged from the pack during the second half of the week, among them a number of familiar suspects from the radio sailing world. The Great Britain team made a strong showing amongst the 22 countries represented, monopolising the top 5 places overall and in total GBR skippers provided 6 of the final top 10.

On 201 points in 10th place Ian Vickers NZL sailing his own V7 had a competitive series, consistently in A fleet and counting 2 race wins. Jeff Byerley AUS finished 9th overall on 198 points sailing his latest design Cheinz. Graham Bantock GBR with 188 points sailed his Pikanto consistently well and was unlucky to slip back to 8th in the final placing. Former World Champion Zvonko Jelacic CRO also on 188 points took a while to get going and eventually managed to place his Pikanto 7th . Overall 6th and highest placed overseas competitor was Alexis Carre FRA sailing the first of the 3 Pikanto’s in the top 10. Robert Walsh GBR sailed the very latest Lintel MMX and with 5 race wins was a serious contender, but under threat of family disconnection decided to discard the final 3 races to attend his sister’s wedding and finished on 122 points (Is there really anything more important than a World Championship? There would have been a real dilemma if Blackpool FC had a match!). Martin Roberts had 2 race wins during the week and scored consistently in A fleet to finish 4th on 110 points having switched to a Lintel for the event.

At present there are only 3 of the latest Brad Gibson designed and built BritPOPs and remarkably they filled the top 3 places. Finishing 3rd overall was Graham Elliott who quietly accumulated a final score of just 95 points including 2 race wins and a string of consistently low scores and was seriously competitive all week while providing laid back video commentary at the end of each day. The other 2 BritPOPs were in the hands of pre-race favourite Brad Gibson and MYA Chairman Peter Stollery. Over the last 3 days only a few points ever separated the pair at the head of the fleet board and in several races they engaged in match racing each other within the fleet.

The final race watched by a sizeable crowd and which they started equal on points, was a classic. Neither made the best of starts but initially Brad (42) surged ahead with Peter (39) a few places back. Both took the starboard gate at the end of the first run, but Brad was the first to tack. Peter stood on on starboard for a few metres then tacked onto a port lift with new pressure which he used to move quickly forward on Brad and rounded the second windward mark ahead. Peter went on to clinch the championship with a last race win to Brads 4th, taking the event with a total score of 56 with Brad as deserved runner up on only 59 points for the 21 scoring races.

Considering his involvement with event organisation and his minimum pre-race practise this was a remarkable win for the 2011 IOM World Champion Peter Stollery. It was a great climax to a sparkling and most enjoyable event. A big thank you to the Race Team under PRO David Coode ably assisted by ARO Graham Allen and to the tremendous effort by the officers, staff and members of West Kirby Sailing Club who, along with the many generous event sponsors made this World Championship such a tremendous success.

Videos from Malcolm Donald:

More information on the event website.

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