Sailing World Champs: Kiwis In Medal Hunt Despite Tough Day

New Zealand’s top crews remain on track for a medal push at the Sailing World Championships in The Hague, despite losing some ground as they battled the world’s best sailors and the elements overnight.

The strong North Sea current has dominated talk for much of the week and it forced a tactical change from Nacra 17 combination Micah Wilkinson and Erica Dawson on day three of the event.

According to Wilkinson, they gambled on a more cautious approach on the start line, after being penalised for getting away too early on the first day.

“We had plenty of current again today, huge current, which made the starts very challenging,” Wilkinson said.

“We were a bit conservative with them, which put us on the back foot but fortunately, we had great [boat] speed.”

The move paid off, as the pair stayed out of early trouble and among the front of the fleet - locking in three more low scores to wrap up qualifying in a strong position.

While Italians Ruggero Tita and Caterina Banti solidified their place atop the leaderboard with another perfect day, only 19 points separate the second-placed German crew Paul Kohlhoff and Alica Stuhlemmer from the Kiwis in tenth.

The top half of the fleet line up in the final series from tomorrow, with a place in the double-points medal race up for grabs.

“I felt like we sailed nicely today and got three solid results. It’s put us in good shape for a big push,” Wilkinson said.

“We have two gold-fleet days. We’re feeling good and I think we're ready to be a little punchier again [at the start] and see how high we can climb.”

Consistency was also a feature of Isaac McHardie and Will McKenzie's day, as the 49er duo picked up three top-six results to remain in eighth overall heading into the next phase.

They are 15 points off a podium spot, with another six races before the medal showdown.

Logan Dunning Beck and Oscar Gunn are 10 points behind their compatriots, after a 17th place, wedged between a fourth and a third, saw them drop two places to 13th overall.

Jo Aleh and Molly Meech also moved down the leaderboard – from fourth to seventh – despite claiming their first race win in the 49erFX fleet.

They found themselves in third earlier in the day after taking out the second race but surrendered the advantage with a score of 10 in their next outing.

“It was nice to get the win, but we made a few mistakes today,” Aleh said.

“Quite a few boats would probably have done things a bit differently, but we’ll enjoy our rest day [tomorrow] and then get ready for the finals series.”

The country's ILCA 7 (Laser) sailors struggled with conditions too, with Tom Saunders (16th) and George Gautrey (24th) ending their first day of competition deeper in the fleet than they would have liked.

Saunders, in his first top-level competition since the Hyeres World Cup in April, couldn't hide his disappointment.

“It’s nice to finally get started, although… today's performance was pretty frustrating,” he said.

“It was hard to pick [the wind shifts] and you sort of had to make your mind up pretty early on. But we’re still there or thereabouts and I’m looking forward to the rest of the week.”

Gautrey, fresh from a fourth place at the Olympic test event in Marseille, was left ruing a few costly errors.

“Conditions were pretty wild – we started racing with a solid 13, 14 knots but it slowly died through the day with big cloud bands making for some funky racing,” he said.

“I never quite got into the first race and had to fight my way back through the fleet. In the second race, I messed up at the first top mark which meant I rounded in 43rd rather than third.”

Olivia Christie and Greta Pilkington are in the bottom half of the ILCA 6 (Laser radial) fleet.

Nine more Kiwis start their world championship campaigns tomorrow – with Veerle ten Have and Josh Armit leading a seven-strong windfoil team.

Kitefoilers Justina Kitchen and Lukas Walton-Keim are also in action for the first time this week.

Results and standings from day 3 at the 2023 Sailing World Championships in The Hague.

49er (83 boats) 
1st: Bart Lambriex/Floris Van De Werken (Ned) 1 4 (5) 2 1 1 3 5 2 - 19 points 
2nd: Diego Botin/Florian Trittel (Esp) 1 1 5 3 (24RDG) 6.8RDG 1 1 2 - 20.8 pts
3rd: Lukasz Przybytek/Jacek Piasecki (Pol) (17) 1 3 4 4 2 3 1 8 - 26 pts
8th: Isaac McHardie/Will McKenzie (NZ) 2 (15) 8 7 2 6 6 6 4 - 41 pts
13th: Logan Dunning Beck/Oscar Gunn (NZ) 2 (29UFD) 12 10 2 1 4 17 3 - 51 pts
48th: Campbell Stanton/William Shapland (NZ) 16 5 (26) 16 10 20 22 14 13 - 116 pts
67th: Sam Bacon/Cailen Rochford (NZ) 12 (29UFD) 18 16 15 7 29DNC 29DNC 29DNC - 155 pts

49erFX (59 boats)
1st: Vilma Bobeck/Rebecca Netzler (Swe) 2 (3) 1 1 1 1 1 3 1 - 11 pts
2nd: Isaura Maenhaut/Anouk Geurts (Bel) 2 2 1 (12) 6 1 4 8 2 - 26 pts
3rd: Olivia Price/Evie Haseldine (Aus) 1 4 2 3 2 5 3 (10) 9 - 29 pts
7th: Jo Aleh/Molly Meech (NZ) 4 7 3 (13) 5 2 12 1 10 - 44 pts
49th: Courtney Reynolds-Smith/Brianna Reynolds-Smith (NZ) 21 14 25 24 23 22 23 (28) 22 - 174 pts

Nacra 17 mixed (49 boats)
1st: Ruggero Tita/Caterina Banti (Ita) 1 1 1 (2) 1 1 1 1 1 - 8 pts
2nd: Paul Kohlhoff/Alica Stuhlemmer (Ger) (8STP) 1 1 2 1 2 2 4 1 - 14 pts
3rd: John Gimson/Anna Burnet (GBR) 3 2 2 3 3 1 3 (5) 5 - 22 pts
10th: Micah Wilkinson/Erica Dawson (NZ) 5 (26UFD) 5 (26UFD) 7 3 2 5 3 4 4 - 33 pts

470 mixed (64 boats)
1st: Keiju Okada/Miho Yoshioka (Jpn) 1 4 1 (6) - 6 pts
2nd: Anton Dahlberg/Lovisa Karlsson (Swe) (11) 5 3 3 - 11 pts
3rd: Simon Diesch/Anna Markfort (Ger) (18) 9 1 5 - 15 pts
47th: Brittany Wornall/Sam Street (NZ) (29) 24 12 19 - 55 pts
59th: Derek Scott/Rebecca Hume (NZ) 27 (28) 27 21 - 75 pts
62nd: Annabelle Rennie-Younger/Blake McGlashan (NZ) 26 32 (33RET) 25 - 83 pts

ILCA 7 (138 boats)
1st: Tonci Stipanovic (Cro) 1 1 - 2 pts
2nd: Michael Beckett (GBR) 3 1 - 4 pts
3rd: Pavlos Kontides (Cyp) 4 2 - 6 pts
16th: Tom Saunders (NZ) 10 13 - 23 pts
24th: George Gautrey (NZ) 15 16 - 31 pts
64th: Luke Deegan (NZ) 43 23 - 66 pts
99th: Caleb Armit (NZ) 39 56 - 95 pts

ILCA 6 (109 boats)
1st: Maria Erdi (Hun) 5 1 - 6 pts
2nd: Carolina Albano (Ita) 4 2 - 6 pts
3rd: Daisy Collingridge (GBR) 8 4 - 12 pts
59th: Olivia Christie (NZ) 19 44 - 63 pts
72nd: Greta Pilkington (NZ) 23 46 - 69 pts

© Scoop Media