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470 World Championships

BRITANNIA RULES THE WAVES BUT FRANCE WINS THE DAY

26 Oct 2022

HIGHLIGHTS

  • Offshore breeze between 10 to 14 knots, with a left-hand trend
  • Start of gold fleet racing and two different GBR boats win today’s races
  • New superstar team Lecointre & Mion win the day with two 2nds
  • Germany’s Wanser & Autenrieth hold on to the yellow bibs
  • Top 10 sees an even split of female/ male and male/ female combinations

Day three of the 470 World Championship in Sdot Yam, Israel, marked the start of gold fleet competition. As a national effort, two different teams from Great Britain each won a race but for individual effort the best day went to Camille Lecointre & Jérémie Mion (FRA) who finished behind the Brits but scored a remarkable two second places.

This news belongs to
2022 470 World Championship
ALL EVENT INFORMATION

 

 
 


ROCKETING UP THE RANKINGS

No one else could come close to the French level of consistency, with this new pairing growing stronger by the day. At the end of the first day of the Worlds the French were in 24th place. By the end of day two, up to 10th place. This evening their two 2nds lift them to 2nd overall on the leaderboard, an incredible comeback from a difficult start.

Even more impressive is the fact that Lecointre has her two children, a five-year-old and a five-month-old with her. Mion commented: “Camille told me she was feeling tired this morning, which is not that surprising as she has to wake up at 4 o’clock in the morning. But she found the energy and we are really happy with how things went on the water.”

As for having her family with her at an important championship, Lecointre wouldn’t have it any other way. “It gives you energy and gives you an appreciation for what we do,” said the double Olympic medallist. “I’m really enjoying having them here and enjoying building a new team with Jérémie.”


BLINKERS ON

In the first gold fleet race, at least half of the 30-boat fleet made a good enough start to be able to hold their lane on starboard tack. However, with the offshore breeze most of the fleet decided to take the wind shifts up the middle of the course. To hedge their bets. No half measures for Vita Heathcote & Ryan Orr (GBR) however. “We knew from yesterday that the pressure was good over there on the left, and we knew before the start that we were going to commit, we weren’t going to muck around with the right-hand side. We had options to tack earlier but we were going fast and it felt good going all the way over there.”
 
Heathcote & Orr put in a truckload of effort into working the boat upwind and downwind, even when they were leading comfortably. “I’m going to sleep well tonight,” said Heathcote. For Orr, he’s only recently come back from a bad fall when he slipped and fell while rock climbing. Rather than wearing thin-soled rubber boots like most of the fleet he’s having to wear thick-soled, soft running trainers to cushion his feet and lower legs while the body is still in repair mode. None of that recent history seemed to hold him back today though. The team won the race by a comfortable margin. A respectable 9th place in the next race lifts the young British team up to 8th overall.


MORE TEA, VICAR?

In the next race it was down to the other GBR team to fly the flag for Great Britain, as Martin Wrigley & Eilidh McIntyre led the way around the first mark and were so far ahead that the only threat ever came from Lecointre and Mion. Asked what the Brits had been drinking this morning, Wrigley quipped: “British tea. We had it flown over specially and that’s making the difference.” Their race win lifts GBR1 to 12th overall and just three points out of the top 10.
 
Jordi Xammar & Nora Brugman (ESP) made a terrible job of the first windward leg of the first race, rounding the top mark in the late teens or early twenties. However the Spaniards kept on chipping away and somehow dragged themselves back to 8th place by the finish. Xammar puffed a big sigh of relief as he crossed the line and the two teammates fist-bumped, knowing that it’s that kind of 8th place that can win you a championship more than the glamorous race victories.


HIS ’N HERS, HERS ’N HIS

Currently the top 10 shows an even distribution of female/ male and male/ female combinations in the new era of Mixed 470 competition. The experiment seems to be working. However Brugman joked that she’s not tall enough. “When Jordi is hiking he is as tall as me on the trapeze,” she laughed. “It makes it very easy to have a face-to-face conversation while we’re racing.”
 
At one point the Spanish found themselves racing side by side with the yellow bib wearers, Luise Wanser & Philipp Autenrieth (GER). Struggling to match the German upwind pace, Brugman shouted: “Why aren’t we faster?” To which Xammar replied: “Because Philipp is 10 kilos heavier than you!”


RISING VALUE OF THE EURO

The Spanish and the Germans are also side by side with each other in the boat park and there is a good banter between these friends on the shore. The fierce rivalry will continue, and at the moment Wanser & Autenrieth continue to set the standard. They scored a 6,4 today, the third best results from the session and have extended the Germans' overall lead to 6 points ahead of the rapidly improving French. Xammar and Brugman have rocketed up from 11th to 3rd overall although the points behind are very close with Italy’s Marco Gradoni & Alessandra Dubbini in 9th overall but only 5 points behind the Spanish. Super tight.
 
Another interesting statistic of the current top 10 is that it is wholly dominated by European crews. Best non-European team is China’s Jianyong Xu & Yahan Tu in 11th overall. 

For the continuation of gold fleet racing on Thursday, first start time has been set for 1400 hours. For live tracking and live broadcast of the racing, go here:
https://www.sport5.co.il/articles.aspx?FolderID=6045&docID=418043
 

To get all the news, photos and updates from the racing, go to https://2022worlds.470.org
 

written by Andy Rice

RESULTS - TOP 3 OVERALL (after seven races)

1. Luise Wanser & Philipp Autenrieth (GER), 21 points

2. Camille Lecointre & Jérémie Mion (FRA), 27 points

3. Jordi Xammar & Nora Brugman (ESP), 37 points

Follow the World Championship at https://2022worlds.470.org

Photo Credit: © Amit Shisel 

Photo Credit: © Kazushige Nakajima

More Photos: https://www.facebook.com/dailysailingjapan

Contact: kazusailing@gmail.com



470 NATIONS TROPHY

Andreas Kosmatopoulos, president of the International 470 Class Association and former 470 World Champion explains the rationale of a new competition within the Worlds. “For the first time in the 470’s history, we have introduced a new trophy in order to determine the best nation in the 470 fleet at the World Championship. The two best teams from the leading nation will receive the trophy followed by the 2nd and 3rd nations, encouraging participation and teamwork. I am thrilled with all the new trophies we introduced this year and next season we are planning to include coaches too. Aside from the 470 Nations Trophy we will award the “470 David Barnes Trophy” in his memory. David belongs to a unique eternal group of true 470 legends such as John Merricks, Kevin Burnham, Yumiko Shige, Joachim Hunger.

470 Nations Trophy Ranking
 

Germany has been leading since day one, while Spain and France continue to close the gap.

Great Britain has made a comeback, climbing from 8th to 4th place.

2022 Mixed 470 World Championship 

SDOT-YAM ISRAEL 21-29 OCTOBER 2022

470 NATIONS TROPHY

RANK

NATION

TEAM 1

TEAM 2

TOTAL

1

GERMANY

1

4

5

2

FRANCE

2

6

8

3

SPAIN

3

5

8

4

G.BRITAIN

8

12

20

5

ITALY

9

19

28

6

CHINA

11

24

35

7

ISRAEL

17

18

35

8

JAPAN

15

25

40

9

SWITZERLAND

22

23

45

10

BRAZIL

16

31

47

11

AUSTRIA

7

42

49

12

PORTUGAL

26

36

62

13

SWEDEN

13

61

74

14

TURKEY

34

47

81

15

AUSTRALIA

35

50

85

16

U.S.A.

37

54

91

17

NEW ZEALAND

45

48

93

18

THAILAND

46

61

107

19

LITHUANIA

58

61

119

20

NORWAY

60

61

121