10 Jun 2009
Light winds, Fierce Competition In Austria
© Organizing Committee
2009 Open 470 Class European Championships for Men/Mixed and Women
5-14 June, Lake Traunsee - Austria
Today should have been the last day of the qualifying series at the Open 470 Class European Championships for Men/Mixed and Women, but the weather conditions keep on having effect on the schedule of both events. Both men’s groups completed one race today, and so did the women’s fleet. Sime Fantela and Igor Marenic (CRO) retain their overall lead but give away their “discard reserve” with a 22nd place in today’s only race. Giulia Conti and Giovanna Micol (ITA) had a bad start, climb back, and secure their leadership with 5th position at the finish.
Although wind conditions are light, competition is fierce. Eight nations from three continents are represented in the current men’s 470 top 10. Even nine nations from the same number of continents are represented in the women’s 470 top 10.
Men’s 470 Although the men from Croatia still lead the men’s 470, Harada Ryunosuko and Yoshida Yugo from Japan do remarkably good. Their record in international 470 sailing goes back to the 2007 ISAF Sailing World Championships where they were lucky to compete in the Gold fleet. At the Semaine Olympique Francaise in Hyères this year, they have their first success in a major event and end in 5th position overall. Also at the Delta Lloyd Regatta they make it to the medal race. Today, they win race 5 in their group and secure their promising second overall position.
Gabrio Zandona and Eduardo Mancinelli (ITA) win today’s race in the other group and climb to a 7th overall position.
Matthew Belcher and Malcolm Page are moving up slowly, but strong. The new Australian team formed out of two top performers, coached by Victor Kovalenko, scored a second place in today’s race. It may be expected that they will increase the pressure on all that is of on top of them the coming days. Malcolm Page won the Open 470 Europeans last year with his former helm; Nathan Wilmot. Page and Wilmot had the highlight in their sailing career sofar, by winning the gold medal in Qingdao 2008.
Sime Fantela and Igor Marenic have been true heroes in the Junior 470 scene by winning the 470 Junior Worlds in 2005 and 2007. Exciting battles have taken place with other talented Juniors, like Levin Eyal and Yam Amir (ISR), who were the strongest in 2006. Croatia left the Junior Worlds’ venue Travemuende with the silver medal. The young talents won the medal race at the 2007 ISAF Sailing World Championships (however ending 6th overall), and made their Olympic debut in Qingdao 2008, where they ended in 9th position.
”The conditions are extremely difficult. The last two days we were lucky with our decisions. Today we decided to sail on the right side of the course, what turned out to be the complete wrong side. We now have to stay calm and concentrated. When we start sailing the gold fleet, it’s more difficult to have good results. Everybody makes mistakes and all teams in the top ten are still able to win the championship. We will see, but we still are full of hope!” Sime Fantela said.
Women’s 470 Margriet Fokkema and Marieke Jongens from The Netherlands score the bullet in today’s only race, successfully finalizing a close battle with Qingdao 2008 Yngling class silver medalists Mandy Mulder and Merel Witteveen, also from the Netherlands. Fokkema and Jongens seem to feel good in light winds. The Dutch ladies, inspired by Olympic dreams at an early age, picked up the silver medal this year at the light wind Semaine Olympique Francaise ISAF World Cup event. They move up to a 9th position overall.
Still it’s Giulia Conti and Giovanna Micol (ITA) and Ai Kondo and Wakoko Tabata (JPN) who make the game in this Open 470 Women’s event. The rivals scored a reasonable 5th and average 14th place respectively, and didn’t shake Jo Aleh amd Olivia Powrie (NZL), and Anthi Economou and Olga Tsigaridi (GRE) off their tail yet.
Nevertheless, it could have been worse for the Italian women. Conti and Micol made a bad start in the race, but recovered perfectly.
“We are close to the half of the event, before we come to the medal race. On this lake you can never be sure about your final rank, before you here the signal of the finishing boat. The wind is very puffy and shifty. If you miss a shift, you can lose up to 20 places. This Championship is about who makes less mistakes then the others. We were the team so far with less wrong decisions. We have tried to use our lake experience from Lake Garda, and so far it worked.” Giulia Conti said.
From Qualifiers into the Final series Racing continues tomorrow to finalize the qualifiers, which should have been completed today. The 470 men will go out on the water, if possible, to have one race, and get back ashore to have results calculated and have protests handled, if any. If the wind conditions will allow racing, the men’s fleet will go out again to start the final series, separated in a gold and silver fleet.
For the Open 470 European Women’s event, it will probably be easier as no calculations have to made, and the same group of 39 crews will continue from the qualifiers into the final series.
For sure is that the medal races in both the men’s and women’s events will take place on the 14th of June.
Full results are available at the event web site: www.traunseewoche.at
Rank Sailnr. helm / crew (last name - first name) points
TOP 10 470 Men
1 CRO 83 Fantela Sime / Marenic Igor 9
2 JPN 4340 Ryunosuke Harada/Yugo Yoshida 14
3 ITA 11 Zeni Fabio / Pitanti Nicola 24
4 AUS 11 Belcher Mathew / Page Malcolm 25
5 GER 49 Zellmer Lucas / Seelig Heiko 26
6 GER 4988 Gerz Ferdinand / Bolduan Tobias 27
7 ITA 2 Zandona Gabrio / Edoardo Mancinelli 29
8 FRA 7 Charbonnier Nicolas / Meyer-Dieu Baptiste 30
9 RUS 7 Vladimir Chaus / Denis Gribanov 37
10 GRE 165 Mantis Panagiotis / Kagialis Pavlos 37
TOP 10 470 Women
1 ITA 23 Conti Giulia / Micol Giovanna 7
2 JPN 4151 Kondo Ai / Tabata Wakako 8
3 NZL 75 Aleh Jo / Powrie Olivia 17
4 GRE 887 Economou Anthi / Tsigaridi Olga 17
5 GER 66 Wagner Annina / Steinherr Marlene 21
6 ESP 133 Gallego Marina / Rita Roman Julia 22
7 AUT 431 Vogl Sylvia / Flatscher Carolina 23
8 GER 4983 Bochmann Annika / Lorenz Anika 24
9 NED 6 Fokkema Margriet / Jongens Marieke 27
10 ESP 696 Pacheco Tara / Betanzos Berta 27
For more information and media enquiries, please contact the International 470 Class Association: office@470.org or visit the official International 470 Class web site at: www.470.org
Photos are available online at: www.470.org/gallery