NZL Sailing Team warm up for World Champs in Israel

NZL Sailing Team warm up for World Champs in Israel

Haifa, Israel will play host to the world’s best Olympic 470 class sailors this month, including NZL Sailing Team crews Jo Aleh and Polly Powrie (pictured), and Paul Snow-Hansen and Daniel Willcox.

The 2015 Men’s and Women’s 470 World Championships gets underway on Monday 12 October and runs for six days. Medal Races and prize-giving are on Saturday 17 October.

Both kiwi crews are among a bevy of international sailors who have arrived in the Israeli coastal city of Haifa early to compete in the 2015 Israel Open 470 National Championships as build-up.

Jo Aleh says; “I have never sailed in Haifa or Israel before, but as I have family over here I have been to Israel lots of times and so I am very happy to finally be sailing. It is beautiful sailing here, so warm, 29 degree water and wind every day. Very amazing!”

Both the NZL Sailing Team 470 crews competed last in Rio de Janeiro for the 2015 Olympic Test Event in August.

Aleh says, “We just had the Test Event in Rio a month and a half ago, and a bit of down time after that, so it's a little bit odd to be suddenly getting ready for the World Champs. But it’s so lovely and warm here, and a beautiful place to sail, so it’s very easy to be highly motivated.”

Aleh and Powrie, known as Team Jolly, will apply the same approach to this World Championship as they do going into any regatta.

“We just want to go out there and have some fun on the water, smash out a few good races and see where that leaves us. Obviously our competitive instincts will kick right in, so we will be putting our all into it, and it will be nice to finish off the year with a good regatta after a tricky event for us in Rio,” explains Aleh.

“With less than a year to go before the Games, every event matters, but more about what we get out of it rather than the numbers we end up with at the end. So this is yet another testing and learning opportunity, and we aim to get as much as we can out of it.”

While New Zealand has already secured Olympic qualification in both the men’s and women’s 470 classes through their performances at the 2014 ISAF Sailing World Championship this month’s regatta in Israel is a significant event for those teams still seeking to qualify their nation to the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, with six places on offer for the 470 Men and three for the 470 Women.

From the current entry list, there are teams from the following 17 nations on the hunt for one of the six places in the 470 Men: Angola, Argentina, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Israel, Italy, Korea, Mexico, Portugal, South Africa, Turkey, Ukraine.

In the 470 women, the maths is 13 nations gunning for three nation places. In contention are teams from: Australia, Canada, Chile, Spain, Finland, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Switzerland, Turkey.

What else is on this year?

New Zealand’s Olympic 470 sailors aren’t the only ones yet to contest their 2015 World Championship titles with the 49er, 49erFX, Finn and Laser Radial classes also scheduled to sail their respective World Champs within the next two months.

2015 49er and 49erFX World Championships
Dates: 16-21 November 2015
Venue: Buenos Aries, Argentina
Featuring: Peter Burling and Blair Tuke, Alexandra Maloney and Molly Meech and a handful of up and coming kiwi 49er crews including Logan Dunning-Beck and Jack Simpson, Markus Somerville and Aaron Hume-Merry, Isaac McHardie and Trent Rippey

2015 Finn Gold Cup
Dates: 24-29 November 2015
Venue: Takapuna, Auckland, New Zealand
Featuring: Andrew Murdoch, Josh Junior and plenty more local and international sailors

Laser Radial World Championships
Dates: 20-26 November 2015
Venue: Al Mussanah, Oman
Featuring: Sara Winther, Susannah Pyatt

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