2024 PredictWind Moth Worlds - Day 2 - Trying to keep up with the Kids
by Richard Gladwell, Sail-World.com/nz 5 Jan 15:01 GMT
4-9 January 2024
Jacob Pye (NZL) - Day 2 - 2024 PredictWind Moth Worlds. Manly Sailing Club. January 5, 2025 © Richard Gladwell - Sail-World.com/nz
For the morning at least, the weather was again the disruptor at on Day 2 of the Predictwind Moth Worlds.
While the waters of the southern end Kawau Bay are generally quite sheltered, the area appears to be very prone - this week at least - to quite sudden squalls - tipping the wind over the racing limit.
It happened on Saturday - Day 1, when one fleet sailed two of the scheduled four races, and the other only managed one. That left a lopsided scoreboard going into Sunday - Day 2. The rules are a little complex, but generally the short-changed fleet has to keep sailing until it catches up with the other.
Each fleet now has five races on the points table, with a further three scheduled for Tuesday - at which point both fleets should have completed eight races and the 74 boat fleet will be split into Gold and Silver fleets for the final two days of racing.
Not a lot can be read into the points table, certainly the two clear leaders of the Qualifying fleets Mattias Coutts (Yellow fleet) and Jacob Pye (Blue fleet) have performed impressively - with three wins for Coutts and four wins from five races for Pye.
However theirs is, at this stage, a battle on paper only.
The fleets are sailing on quite different water (with two courses in play), and a different set of competitors.
Due to the way the fleets have been split, following the Oceania series last week - we haven't seen Coutts come up against Pye - that won't happen until Finals racing - which can run to eight races over the two days allowed for the Finals and with a new world champion to be found on Thursday afternoon.
Coutts was sailing in the Yellow fleet, which was assigned to the Bravo course, located off Orewa - which for those not familiar with the geography is a long beach not part of the Whangaparaoa Peninsular, which runs in an east-west direction on the southern side of the race area in Kawau Bay.
Alpha course is adjacent to Manly Sailing Club - located about mid-way down the peninsular, also on a long beach, but with the prevailing SW breeze more affected by the surrounding hills and small bays.
The unimpeded breeze really honks out of Orewa in a squall, and that is what happened today, as yet another rainsquall came through - causing a morning race to be abandoned after the start due to safety reasons. It was a little more straight forward on Alpha course, but around noon racing was suspended with both fleets returning to shore - and for a while that could have been it for the day.
However in the early afternoon, the skies cleared somewhat, the sun came out and the racing continued in both fleets in winds of 12-20kts. Mattias Coutts and the Yellow fleet off Orewa were the first to complete their racing for the day and had a long fast reach back to the sailing club.
Perhaps the most significant aspects of the regatta are the dominance of Coutt and Pye, and then the dominance of the youth sailors as a group. Only two of the top 12 overall are Open fleet sailors.
Then run your finger down the names column and there is some heavy metal - including Olympic Gold medalists and 2024 America's Cup sailors, who are not able to match the consistency of the Youth sailors. The kids are doing all right, thank you.
For sure this is only the Qualification round, and the objective is to make the cut for the Gold fleet - which should go in at #37 in the Qualifiers.
2012 Olympic Gold medalist Iain Jensen sits in 34th, with the highly credentialled British sailor Hattie Rogers in 35th and she is one of three sailors on 92pts - and currently, if the cut goes in at 37th place - then the two competitors straddling the cut point at 37th and 38th - are currently on 93pts each.
That will be a very hard call - but underlines the fact that making the Gold fleet cut is an imperative for the sailing rockstars - if only as a part-measure of their self-assessed success at this regatta.
Of course, in the big picture, a top place in this Worlds is a sure way of being noticed by the America's Cup talent scouts, now that we are at the start of the 38th America's Cup cycle.
Who knows where some of these sailors could be three years hence - nationality rule or not.
Three races are scheduled for Monday, with first fleet away at 1100hrs - weather permitting, of course.
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