Yellow fleet start on 3rd day

 

Travis Dow, New Zealand's National champion and only representative at the 2007 Laser 4.7 Worlds currently being held in South Africa, had a great 3rd day with a 3rd and 4th in the two races sailed.  Travis is competing against 117 other sailors from around the world, with series currently being led by a Slovenian Sailor, Andraz Gulic, who did very well on the first very light wind day with 2 firsts. The 3 Slovenian sailors entered dominate the top 10 lying 1st, 3rd, & 6th

NZL's Travis Dow leads 6th placed SLO Matej Valic 9th placed CRO Filip Matika

 

The Regatta is being sailed at Hermanus Yacht Club (see bottom of map above) on a salt water lagoon which is reputed to be a heavy wind venue but the South African Nationals & Pre Worlds Regatta held a week ago at the same venue were sailed in light winds with lightweight (ex)Optimist sailors dominating the results which did not suit Travis who is at the heavier end of the fleet.  Travis did well though to finish 6th out of 50 in the pre worlds.  The 118 competitors are split into 2 fleets of 59 racing each day and the first race day was again light with races being postponed and the fleet sent ashore twice.  Two Races were able to be sailed though one had to be restarted and another shortened because of the flukey conditions. Travis had his worse results of the Regatta in the light wind minefield with a 31 & 49.  With large fleets mark roundings are congested and there have been plenty of protests at the Regatta.

Travis comes into the bottom mark behind a Brazilian Sailor

 

The 10 knot wind for Day 2 allowed racing to get underway on time although it did move around a bit leading to a number of general recalls and subsequent Black Flag starts as start lines became very biased.  Mark roundings were again congested with a number of collisions and protests.  Travis did better in the more stable conditions and scored a 16th & a 7th as the wind increased for the second race of the day.

 

 Travis runs to the bottom mark well clear on day 3

 

Day 3 was a better day for Travis with the wind reaching 16 knots before dying in the afternoon and then building again late in the day, but the start lines were still biased with the wind in the lake like conditions favouring the left hand side of the course and so general recalls were the result.  Travis did well to avoid the trouble of the 7 starts required in his blue fleet to get its second race underway and pick the correct side of the course to record a 3rd to go with his 4th in the morning.

Travis well clear and able to hike!

 

Eight more races are expected over the next four days so we hope for more wind for Travis which will allow him to drop his other result from Day 1 and rocket further up the leader board.  The top 20 sailors out the 118 after 6 races are shown below.

1 SLO 174364 GULIC, Andraz u19 Male 1 1 5 5 (18) 4 16  2 PER 182329 ZIMMERMANN, Alexander u19 Male 13 2 1 (20) 8 2 26

3 SLO 174365 BOZIC, Jakob u19 Male 1 6 (19) 13 9 3 32  4 RSA 158277 SHAW, Matthew u19 Male 4 12 11 (18) 1 5 33

5 ITA 178472 BIGNOLI, Boris u19 Male 6 4 3 11 (23) 9 33  6 SLO 174367 VALIC, Matej u19 Male 3 11 7 (16) 7 5 33

7 BRA 185098 PINNA, Baepi u19 Male 24 3 4 1 4 (31) 36  8 SUI 184732 SCHOPFER, Jonathan u19 Male 4 (34) 8 1 8 17 38

9 CRO 187073 MATIKA, Filip u19 Male 9 10 6 (16) 3 14 42  10 GRE 181562 THEODOSIADIS, Lazaros u19 Male 7 13 5 11 (27) 12 48

11RSA151451THOMPSON, Brevan u15 Male 15 15 13 3 6 (27) 52 12 TUR 180251 KARAHAN, Canberk u19 Male 17 (29) 9 25 2 2 55

13 USA 186543 HALL, Cameron u19 Male 8 22 3 19 (24) 7 59  14 NZL 191623 DOW, Travis u19 Male 31 (49) 16 7 4 3 61

15CRO 183988 HLANUDA, Luciano u19 Male (36) 30 2 9 17 4 62 16ITA187653 SABBATINI, Giacomo u19 Male 27 4 4 15 (55) 12 62

17POL174566 OGRODNIK,Piotr u19 Male 14 9 18 (24) 1 22 64 18 ITA 188552 TORTAROLO, Martino u19 Male 10 27 8 (28) 13 7 65

19GRE171321KONTOVRAKIS, Manolis u19 Male (43) 11 2 8 13 34 68 20GBR176333WRAY, Daniel u19 Male 24 7 10 (raf) 18 10 69

The 2008 Laser 4.7 worlds will be held in Croatia and if there are more than 15 Laser 4.7 entries at the NZ Laser Nationals later this month in Taupo then the New Zealand Laser Association (NZLA) will look at sending a team to Croatia.  The NZ Laser Nationals will also be used as a qualification Regatta for the Youth and Men's 2008 Radial World Championships to be held in Takapuna in March.  Any sailors wishing to sail in the Youth (Male & Female) and Men's 2008 Radial Worlds need to Register their interest with the NZLA before 7 January 2008 so that then NZLA can apply for NZL places at the Worlds.

Follow this link to get more information on the NZ Laser Nationals and Radial Worlds

Follow this link to go to the 2007 Laser 4.7 World Championships Website

 Link to Report on Days 4 & 5 of Worlds