Cottonfield ISAF Match Racing Worlds Day 1

WHEN: August 15th to 22nd 1999
WHERE: Skovshoved Harbour, Copenhagen, Denmark
WHO: Ten of the best match racers in the world

BERTRAND PACE UNDEFEATED AT THE END OF DAY 1

Frenchman Bertrand Pace has finished the first day of the Cottonfield ISAF Match Racing World Championships at the top of the leaderboard, undefeated in seven races.

Pace, who is ranked fourth in the world, and will skipper one of the French challenges in the America's Cup, which starts two months today, controlled every race except the last, when he was pushed all the way by local skipper Sten Mohr.

The defending world champion, Peter Gilmour of Australia, who will represent Japan at the America's Cup, had a less than satisfactory day, finishing in seventh place, with only two victories and four defeats.

A philosophical Gilmour commented, "it was a mess today, but we'll try and come back with a smile on our faces tomorrow," and he has a track record of recovering from poor starts to win events.

Second at this stage of the regatta is Denmark's Sten Mohr, who has five wins and only two losses, he said at the end of the day, "we never felt that we were faster than anyone else, but our tactician did a great job."

It was in the last race of the day that Mohr faced Pace, and it was one of the best matches, with the result in doubt until the finishing gun was fired.

The Frenchman was penalised early on, and elected to try and open up a big enough gap to do a penalty turn at the finish, instead of trying to force the Dane into an infringement.

The strategy look doubtful, as Pace struggled to open up a gap from the Dane, eventually breaking free just before the last mark, and just completing his penalty turn before crossing the finishing line, with less than a boat's length to spare.

Sweden's Magnus Holmberg holds onto third place with four wins, the same number as Jesper Bank of Denmark, but the Dane has more losses than the Swede.

The youngest skipper in the event, Kiwi Dean Barker is fifth, with 3.5 points, having been penalised half a point for a finishing line collision, that caused damage to Sten Mohr's boat.

On three wins, and in sixth place is England's Chris Law, just ahead of Gilmour.

Three skippers have just one win a piece, Marcus Weiser and Jochen Schumann of Germany, plus Dane Morten Henriksen.

Conditions were almost perfect, with a breeze that built from 12 knots in the morning to a steady 18 knots by early afternoon, under a mostly blue sky.

RESULTS

Pos Helm              Country     wins losses
---------------------------------------------
 1  Bertrand Pace     France       7    0 
 2  Sten Mohr         Denmark      5    2
 3  Magnus Holmberg   Sweden       4    2
 4  Jesper Bank       Denmark      4    3
 5  Dean Barker       New Zealand  4    2 * 3.5 points
 6  Chris Law         Britain      3    3
 7  Peter Gimour      Australia    2    4
 8  Marcus Wieser     Germany      1    4 
 9  Jochen Schumann   Germany      1    5
10  Morten Henriksen  Denmark      1    6

Event Website: www.sail.dk