55th Governor's Cup Day 1
by Susan Kenney 27 Jul 2022 14:17 AEST
July 25-30, 2022
Teams Petersen (USA) and Egan (USA) on day 1 of the 55th Governor's Cup © Longpré Photos
World Champion Jeffrey Petersen's Golden State Match Racing Team continue their winning ways
Jet lag for defending champion Jeffrey Petersen (USA) of host Balboa Yacht Club is evidently not a problem as he stands in first place at the end of the first day of the Governor's Cup International Youth Match Racing Championship with a score of six wins against one loss. Petersen returned Sunday from the Youth Match Racing World Championship in Pornichet, France, which he won. Four other teams had sailors that had to do a quick recovery from their trip to the Worlds and all had a good day against a very evenly matched fleet of twelve teams from five countries.
Petersen's one loss was to Cole Tapper (AUS) a first-time GovCup skipper whose crew includes his older brother Finn, who has skippered in the Cup before. Petersen's last race in the seven "flights" of the round-robin completed on Day 1 was not without drama as he trailed Robbie McCutcheon (NZL) at the first windward mark, a surprise since McCutcheon and team were winless on the day. Petersen and his experienced Governor's Cup and World Championship crew made short work of the Kiwi team with a quick jibe and better spinnaker trim and went on get a relatively easy win.
Close behind Petersen are Marius Westerlind (SWE) and Marcello Torre (AUS) at 5-2. Westerlind placed 2nd to Petersen in the Worlds and also seemed immune to jet lag. As usual, Westerlind was the star of the Monday night opening dinner and Meet the Teams "roast" of the crews. When asked if his father, Marcus, a 470 class Olympian was coming to watch this year as he did last year when Westerlind ended up 12th, Westerlind said, "No, he saw me last year and didn't know I was good until last week [at the Worlds] and by that time it was too late to book a plane ticket!"
The early "surprise" team was Torre since Western Australia was one of the most isolated locations in the world given both normal geography and, lately, Covid restrictions. However, Perth and the Royal Freshwater Bay Yacht Club have always produced great match racers, including two-time Governor's Cup winner Sam Gilmour and Torre's coach, GovCup veteran Will Boulden. So far, it looks like Torre is very comfortable with the pressure of living up to that reputation.
Three sailors are tied on four wins, two of them being representatives from the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia (CYCA), Will Sargent and Cole Tapper. Both are also among the "jet set" who traveled from France on Sunday. Tapper and Sargent sailed with Cole Tapper's older brother, Finn, in the Worlds which is perhaps evidence of the quality of the CYCA youth programs.
The third of the trio tied for 4th is Robbie King (GBR) who is actually living in Pasadena, California as a PhD student in quantum computing at Cal Tech. Despite King's best efforts in explaining his studies, so far none of the competitors nor spectators have yet figured out what he's talking about!
The format of the series is a double "round-robin" where every team sails against every other team twice. Then the four teams with the most points (1 point for a win and 0 for a loss) will advance to the semi-finals. The two semi-final winners will sail in the finals on Saturday, July 30.
The complete standings after Day 1 are below, courtesy of www.matchracingresults.com. Live coverage of the Governor's Cup by BYC's "GovCup TV" team will include pre-race morning shows hosted by 12-time America's Cup veteran manager Tom Ehman at 09:00 PDT/ 16:00 UTC Wednesday through Saturday. The semi-final and finals racing will be live-streamed Friday and Saturday, July 29-30, starting at 11:30 PDT / 18:30 UTC both days. A press conference with the semi-final skippers and crews will air Friday at 18:30 hours, with the finalists on Saturday at 16:45 PDT / 23:45 UTC. All live coverage will be streamed on the Balboa YC YouTube channel and the BYCGovCup and BYC Facebook pages. You can watch live or on demand at a later time.
www.govcupracing.com