Experience to the fore - Day 3 ILCA (Laser) Nationals at Murrays Bay

Caleb Armit (Laser Radial) - Oceanbridge NZL Sailing Regatta - Day 2 - February 2 © Richard Gladwell

Another really successful day, with all scheduled races completed.

The weather for Day 3 of the NZ ILCA Nationals pretty much followed the forecast, with the mornings 10 knot SW breeze shifting to the S soon after the start of racing and staying there for the afternoon, and unlike yesterday it never got much over 10 knots.

The breeze was again patchy and fairly shifty all day, providing plenty of challenges for the fleets. The wind against the incoming tide made the starts tricky, and general recalls, black flags and OCS's featured quite frequently in todays results.

If Day 3 is traditionally "moving day" then Luke Deegan from Pupuke sure took it to heart and moved. He simply dominated the ILCA 7 fleet today with three bullets, and takes a solid 10 point lead into tomorrow's final two scheduled races.

Overnight leader Luke Cashmore was one to suffer starting line blues, with two OCS's in the three races unfortunately dropping him out of title contention. It was a good day for the U21 sailors, with Caleb Armit and Dylan Forsyth having really solid days to lie second and third overall and Matthew Rist having top four results in Races 7 and 8. Caleb and Dylan have opened up a good points gap over top Master Scott Leith, who is forth overall.

Leading AM Tim Pitcaithly is eighth overall while leading GM Andrew Dellabarca and second placed master Dean Barker also had solid days today, each with three consistent top performances to lie tenth and eleventh overall. Nick Page narrowly held onto the lead in the GGM's.

While holding onto a dominant lead in the ILCA 6 Masters Phil Wild finally showed he is not infallible, with second overall Josh Edmonds (A) taking the bullet in the last race today. Master David Johnson from Tauranga also has a great day to move to third overall, opening up a nice points margin on fourth placed Ed Tam. Werner Hennig remains the leading GM.

In the Women's Masters Georgina Wooldridge continues to lead despite the efforts of second placed Helen Spencer from Tauranga, who reportedly lost focus in the last race while she focused on her key issue for the day, getting the correct beach trolley when she got back to the beach!

Starts proved a major challenge for the large 60 boat ILCA 6 Open fleet, with several general recalls and an unfortunate crop of OCS's and Black flags. Cool heads prevailed however and experienced Women Olivia Christie and Annabelle Rennie-Younger stamped their authority on the fleet, both recording 3 top results to be tied on point at the top of the fleet.

They are followed in third overall by Open sailor George Lane, another to deliver consistently strong results in all todays races. After sailing exceptionally well on the first two days George Pilkington found today's condition more challenging and while he continue to be the leading Youth Boy he now sits 4th overall. It was a similar story for Ethan Fong, who remains second in the Youth Boys while Louie Poletti from Picton was able to move up to third Youth Boy courtesy of three good results today. In the Youth Girls Naomi Ferrissey from host club Murray Bay nailed it again today and sits twelfth overall. She takes a big points advantage into the final day over Maddie Rist and Daniella Wooldridge.

The weather models disagree on what we might get tomorrow, but it look light and challenging from whatever direction we end up with. We will all be hoping to get the last two scheduled races in before the 3:30 cutoff to round out a highly successful event.

Nick Page ILCA.nz

For full Results murraysbay.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/2023-NZ-ILCA-7-6-4-National-Championships.pdf