NZL Sailing Team: Double gold for NZ sailors at Kiel Week

by Yachting New Zealand 24 Jun 2018 22:36 PDT

New Zealand won two gold medals at Kiel Week overnight (NZ time), with Josh Junior winning the Finn and Alex Maloney and Molly Meech taking out the 49erFX.

Most of the New Zealand sailors were using Kiel Week as their final regatta before the upcoming sailing world championships in Aarhus and most will feel heartened ahead of the pinnacle event of the year.

On top of the two medals, Andy Maloney finished fourth in the Finn and Gemma Jones and Jason Saunders were pipped for bronze in the Nacra 17 by one point. Paul Snow-Hansen and Dan Willcox (8th men's 470), Josh Porebski and Trent Rippey (7th 49er), Logan Dunning Beck and Oscar Gunn (8th 49er) and Liv Mackay and Micah Wilkinson (10th Nacra) also achieved top-10 results.

Junior went into the day only one point behind Great Britain's Ed Wright in the heavyweight dinghy but three other sailors also had hopes of claiming gold, including Andy Maloney who started the day in third, so he couldn't afford to focus on only one rival.

Junior didn't get a great start but did his best to stay in phase upwind and then find more pressure on the downwinds and came through to finish fourth in the medal race.

"I sailed a bloody good race in super shifty conditions," said Junior, who is working closely with Maloney as they build towards the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. "This regatta has been great for Andy and I and shows the work we have been doing over the last few months is starting to come together for both of us.

"It feels good to win, just because it validates that what we are doing is working and we'll look to keep improving. We're really happy with how things are going. It's not really even about the results but about how we are moving forward."

Maloney and Meech have also proved they're in good form in 2018 and their win at Kiel Week comes on the back of gold at their last regatta at the World Cup in Hyeres and silver at the Princess Sofia regatta in Palma.

They went into the final day with a 4.5-point lead over their nearest rivals and, although they finished second in the double-points top-10 medal race, it didn't exactly go to plan.

"Unfortunately, it was a bit of a come-from-behind race so we didn't really execute our plan for the first half," Maloney said. "But it was really shifty and we managed to play the shifts well and got ourselves back in touch with the fleet and we had a really good downwind as well.

"It kind of summed up the week. You had to keep trying because it was never over until it was over.

"It's always good to come away with the win and helps the confidence ahead of the worlds as well. We are starting to get our processes working well and working well as a team so it feels like things are clicking. It will be good to keep the momentum going through to the worlds."

Jones and Saunders are keen to get some more racing in before the world championships after narrowly missing out on bronze in Kiel so will compete at next month's Nacra European championships.

"It was s a tough race for us," Saunders said. "We didn't have a great start but sailed well early on to be in medal position before getting stuck in a hole downwind trying to cover our competition. Unfortunately, they sailed around us in good breeze and we lost our chance.

"It was a pretty disappointing way for us to finish the regatta but luckily enough we have the Europeans in two weeks' time to bounce back and give ourselves a last event before the worlds."

Results and standings after the final day of the Kiel Week regatta overnight (NZ time):

Men's 470 (49 boats)

1st: Mathew Belcher / Will Ryan (AUS) 1 2 (13) 2 3 4 3 1 8 2 - 26 points 2nd: Anton Dahlberg / Fredrik Bergstrom (SWE) 2 5 1 1 1 (6) 2 3 6 16 - 37 pts 3rd: Kevin Peponnet / Jeremie Mion (FRA) 3 4 2 2 9 (11) 5 2 7 10 - 44 pts

8th: Paul Snow-Hansen / Dan Willcox (NZL) 4 2 11 3 6 3 4 15 (20) 18 - 66 pts

Women's 470 (28 boats)

1st: Silvia Mas / Patricia Cantero (ESP) 12 (29 UFD) 5 1 4 1 1 1 9 2 - 36 pts 2nd: Maria Bozi / Rafailina Klonaridou (GRE) 7 2 6 2 (29 BFD) 2 5 3 1 12 - 40 pts 3rd: Nadine Bohm / Ann-Christin Golias (GER) 2 4 3 7 3 4 6 (9) 6 8 - 43 pts

11th: Courtney Reynolds-Smith / Brianna Reynolds-Smith (NZL) 3 (16) 16 5 9 16 11 8 16 - 84 pts

49er (87 boats)

1st: Jonas Warrer / Jakob Precht Jensen (DEN) 5 11 5 5 1 (17) 11 1 8 1 6 - 54 pts 2nd: Federico Alonson / Arturo Alonson Tellechea (ESP) 3 15 3 1 7 5 7 14 (31) 2 8 - 65 pts 3rd: Lukasz Przybytek / Pawel Kolodzinski (POL) 3 14 7 2 4 9 5 13 (16) 3 10 - 70 pts

7th: Josh Porebski / Trent Ripey (NZL) 5 3 3 6 5 (21) 3 15 10 20 14 - 84 pts 8th: Logan Dunning Beck / Oscar Gunn (NZL) 15 2 1 1 9 18 13 (22) 7 14 12 - 92 pts 13th: Isaac McHardie / William McKenzie (NZL) 4 4 28 15 6 1 (32) 17 3 9 - 87 pts

49erFX (54 boats)

1st: Alex Maloney / Molly Meech (NZL) 3 4 1 10 6 1 5 13.5 1 (14) 4 - 48.5 pts 2nd: Tina Lutz / Susann Beucke (GER) 5 3 3 1 8 4 8 (13.5) 5 12 12 - 61 pts 3rd: Julia Gross / Hanna Klinga (SWE) 2 5 6 7 3 3 (18) 10 13 2 14 - 65 pts

Finn (79 boats)

1st: Josh Junior (NZL) 10 (20) 5 2 3 13 1 15 8 - 57 pts 2nd: Anders Pedersen (NOR) 12 1 11 (20) 11 9 2 11 4 - 61 pts 3rd: Ed Wright (GBR) 3 4 13 (17) 12 1 8 7 16 - 64 pts

4th: Andy Maloney (NZL) 15 7 3 1 14 7 9 (16) 12 - 68 pts

Nacra 17 (44 boats)

1st: John Gimson / Anna Burnet (GBR) 3 2 5 1 3 1 3 2 (11) 3 12 - 35 pts 2nd: Jason Waterhouse / Lisa Darmanin (AUS) 1 1 1 2 3 6 (18) 5 7 4 6 - 36 pts 3rd: Thomas Zajac / Barbara Matz (AUT) 2 4 3 3 2 4 11 (13) 3 5 14 - 51 pts

4th: Gemma Jones / Jason Saunders (NZL) 2 5 1 5 4 5 6 7 (8) 1 16 - 52 pts 10th: Liv Mackay / Micah Wilkinson (NZL) 4 5 (24 DNF) 2 1 11 7 10 14 11 20 - 85 pts

Women's Laser Radial (82 boats)

1st: Anne-Marie Rindom (DEN) 2 1 (5) 5 2 4 1 2 - 17 pts 2nd: Line Flem Host (NOR) 1 (11) 1 4 1 3 2 14 - 26 pts 3rd: Josefin Olsson (SWE) 3 (40 BFD) 3 6 4 5 4 6 - 31 pts

13th: Susannah Pyatt (NZL) 5 11 12 3 6 (22) 17 - 54 pts

Laser Radial worlds (97 boats)

1st: Zac Littlewood (AUS) 4 1 2 1 1 1 1 (6) 3 4 - 18 pts 2nd: Aleksander Arian (POL) 3 1 1 10 4 2 4 3 5 (15) - 33 pts 3rd: Caelin Winchcombe (AUS) 2 2 1 2 2 4 (36) 19 1 1 - 34 pts

6th: Josh Armit (NZL) 1 3 (47 DNC) 1 8 12 18 2 4 6 - 55 pts 42nd: Caleb Armit (NZL) 5 34 21 18 44 (46) 32 25 44 38 - 260 pts

Full results can be found www.manage2sail.com