Postcard Weather Doing Few Favours for WA’s Sailors in Genoa
The Genoa World Cup sailing event in Italy has felt more like a mini European holiday for WA’s athletes so far with a second straight day of light winds restricting the course to a small bunch of completed races.
The men’s and women’s 470 crews have been forced to put their feet up across two days of postponed racing but the postcards have had to wait for the Gilmour brothers who have made a strong start to their limited campaign.
The 49er fleet have managed three races with David and Lachie Gilmour carding second, seventh and another second place finish to date. The brothers are provisionally ranked third but with split fleets on uneven completed races, tallyboards bare little meaning thus far.
The 49erFX class is yet to register overall standings, but WA’s Caitlin Elks and her skipper Amelia Stabback have enjoyed the best race results to date from an Australian perspective, over the few races completed so far.
Just a single race has been possible in the laser and laser radial classes with WA athletes Luke Elliott (5th) and Elyse Ainsworth (29th) both competing.
The laser field will take on a sharper focus in coming events when the full international contingent arrives for the Hyeres World Cup in France, which will double as a qualification event for this year’s European Championships.
Current Australian rankings:
49er (65 boats) – one race on Day 3 for Blue fleet only
3rd David and Lachy Gilmour 2, 7, 2
Yellow fleet – no racing on Day 3
20th Sam and Will Phillips 9, 15
33rd Thomas Needham and Joel Turner
44th Kurt Hansen and Simon Hoffman
49erFX (49 boats) – No overall standings as Yellow fleet is one race behind
34th Amelia Stabback and Caitlin Elks 11, 19, UFD
39th Tess Lloyd and Jaime Ryan 12, 22, 10
42nd Natasha Bryant and Annie Wilmot 19, 19, 6
470 Men’s (44 boats) – No racing as yet
Mat Belcher and Will Ryan
Chris Charlwood and Josh Dawson
470 Women’s (35 boats) – No racing as yet
Nia Jerwood and Monique de Vries
Laser (109 boats) – No racing on Day 3
5th Luke Elliot 3
Laser Radial (67 boats) after one race
29th Elyse Ainsworth 15