Eidie tops Grundig Women's J/70 Cup at Royal Norwegian Yacht Club
by J/Boats 11 Jun 2023 17:13 BST
3-4 June 2023
Grundig Women's J/70 Cup 2023 © Grundig Sailing Cup
Last weekend, the KNS (Royal Norwegian Yacht Club) played host to twenty women's teams sailing in the GRUNDIG Women's J/70 Cup on the inner Oslo Fjord in Norway.
The regatta was a "qualifier" for the J/70 Women's SAILING Champions League Regatta that will be taking place in September 2023 at the Royal Danish YC in Sundby, Denmark (just north of Copenhagen).
With over 100 women sailors on the water, the remarkably well-choreographed support boat teams ensured rotations of crews into and out of the boat between races were swift and efficient. As a result, over the three days of racing, the full slate of ten races was completed for each of the twenty teams. The event followed the well-established J/70 sailing league formula, with teams rotating in after two races from large RIB support boats. The races were short, intense 15-20 minutes windward-leeward races.
What was notable was that one team stood out above the rest, Marthe Eide's team of Ragna and Lillan Agerup, and Tiril Bue. Starting the series with two bullets, they never looked back as they continued to post mostly firsts (7) and seconds (3) for a final score of 20 pts.
The GODE VIBBER 2 team of Marie Lothe, Svenja Christensen, Lene Hjellestad, Jorun Renna, and Anne Reumer started with their "training race"- a last place 6th in their first start- then managed to nearly duplicate the consistency and mostly podium scores as Eide's team, winning four races themselves for a total of 27.6 pts to take the silver medal. Rounding out the podium in third place was Anette Melsom Myhre's team of Tine Simensen Oldereid, Karen Kristoffersen, and Madeleine Osteby. Despite winning five races, their shocker was their 7th race OCS which hit them for 11 pts... a gut punch to their efforts to win the regatta, instead finishing with 31.2 pts.
Rounding out the top five in this hotly contested regattas was Siri Kamfjord's BLUE IRIS team of Anna Gregersson, Mari Sveen, & Janina Bohmer in fourth place and Ida Kathrine Berthet's NEW WAVE crew of Linda Cerup-Simonsen, Sue Penty, and Tonje Edland in fifth place.