B14 European Championships at Yacht Club de Carnac - Day 1

Day 1 of B14 European Championships at Carnac © Alex Hayes

Day 1 of the B14 Europeans, and the question was would we see any breeze as the last two days had shown little enthusiasm to appear. The good news was the breeze kicked in on queue and the sun stayed out for most of the racing. We even had some showers but as it was so hot and the breeze improved, it was refreshing and did not cause the day to be any less enjoyable.

Wind was from the west and ranged from 8 - 14 knots with fairly flat sea and some big sea monsters which did cause issues for several teams.

There were no recalls as the fleet sailed under the U flag with a threat of the Black Flag. So your correspondent can report that all behaved themselves. Probably having the fleet being pushed away from the line helped.

So down to the racing and the all important which hemisphere has bragging rights end of day 1.

There were three races and three race winners.

Race 1 AUS 375 (Craig Garmston/Louis Chapman(GBR)) did a sterling job from the committee boat end and led from half way up the first beat to win from Brightline (Mark Watts/Matt Johnson(GBR)) and Harken (Nick Craig/Toby Lewis(GBR)) sailing a blinder offshore down the last run to pass Team GUL/North Sails (Mark Barnes/Charlotte Horlock(GBR)).

Race 2 and the fleet split left and right with AUS offshore and GBR's best inshore. After the first round and a few place changes, Harken came through to chase Bone Work (Scott Cunningham/James Walker(AUS)) but could not close them down with AUS 375 third.

Race 3 and the breeze was up, but would fade towards the end to 8 knots. Harken got a shift on and headed right again chasing the last of the cloud with Team GBR. Team AUS again headed offshore and we had a resumption of the battle of the sides. This time Harken reigned and held to the finish followed home by AUS 375 and Brightline who overtook Team GUL/North Sails and their sea monster on the last run.

Leading the Classic fleet is Caron Composites (Paul Gifford/Rob Taylor(GBR)) in 15th overall followed by GBR 749 (Will Rand/Querine Van Meurs(GBR)) in 20th.

So after a day of big and small battles on the water, tomorrow is forecast to be lighter bringing the Europeans to the fore, but be sure the Aussie contingent will have a lot to say about the matter and it will not be over till the fat lady sings.

Now on to the opening ceremony and exchanging of stories from the day over a few glasses of wine and beer.

Tomorrow is again scheduled to have three 50 minute full-on races.

Results available at www.yccarnac.com/b14-race-documents.html