Four men for a title

28th January 2008  

Postma in 3rd overall

For the first time since the start of the Finn Gold Cup, the lead has changed hands.
After an intense race Ben Ainslie passed Dan Slater on the line to get ahead by one point before tomorrow’s medal race. With Pieter Jan Postma climbing to 3rd and Jonas Hoegh-Christensen in 4th position after a 9th in today’s race, the top 4 contenders are within 10 points going into tomorrow’s Medal race. It will be a four man battle for the title.

Today’s race was scheduled at 2.3O PM but Race 8 started 2 hours later. After a general recall, the course was postponed to wait for the wind to settle. One hour later, the racing committee decided to move the course further out to catch the breeze. The wind started to fill in and provided a nice race with the wind increasing up to 15 knots.

Sweden Daniel Birgmark sailed smartly to lead the fleet to the top mark. He stayed in control from start to finish and claimed the race. Ranked 7th in the World, Birgmark has known better days. “It was definitely worth the wait. It is good to finally sail well.”

Guillaume Florent from France and Tim Goodbody(IRL) took second and 3rd place. Ben Ainslie, tenth at the top mark, gradually gained places. Turning 5th onto the run, under Oscar flag allowing for free pumping, Ainslie stayed close behind Slater waiting for a good opportunity. A few meters from the finish, Ainslie gybed to take a wave that propelled him ahead of Slater.
31st at the top mark, Pieter-Jan Postma made a huge recovery passing 25 boats to finish 6th in the race.

“It doesn’t really matters who from Ben or I passed the other today” explained Dan Slater after racing, “tomorrow’s medal race counting double is minimising the one point gap between us.” This will not be the first time that the two sailors will be competing for the same title. “This is bringing some old memories of times when Ben and I where racing against each other in the Laser.” The New Zealander acknowledges that tomorrow’s will be a 4 men battle.

Pieter-Jan Postma (NED) is looking forward tomorrow’s final race: “I will prepare myself for an optimum race. I am not going out there just to beat the other guys. I will only focus on my sailing and I want to push my own abilities.”
The battle for the Olympic berths will see the last opportunities during the last race tomorrow. Turkey is still placed 6th nation among the countries yet to qualify. Ukraine and Portugal are only 11 and 17 points behind and will try for their last opportunity tomorrow.

The medal race is scheduled to start directly after the final race for competitors placed higher than 11th.


By Corinne McKenzie