The world’s most talented women match racers have descended upon Newport, Rhode Island and the New York Yacht Club’s Harbour Court Clubhouse for their world championship that commences today and runs until 25 September.
Although the discipline of match racing is relatively new in women’s sailing, only selected as an Olympic sport in late 2008, this group that is loaded with Olympic medalists and world champions is already bringing action-packed, top level racing to each event.
The Australian team of Nicky Souter, sailing with Nina Curtis, Olivia Price and Laura Baldwin are coming into the event as favourites in front of powerhouse teams from France, United States and Denmark.
Souter is the reigning world champion and also won back-to-back events recently including last month’s Skandia Sail for Gold regatta in Weymouth, Great Britain and last week’s Buddy Melges Challenge at the US Sailing Center in Sheboygan, Wisconsin.
Both Souter and fellow Australian Katie Spithill are confident that even though they have had only limited experience in the Sonar they’ll be ready to go for the first race today.
“Myself, Olivia and Laura have never raced Sonars before, while Nina has done one event on them years ago,” said Souter.
“Hopefully, we can adapt to these boats quickly in our limited training time as we have had to make the most of the last few days leading up to the worlds. “
Spithill said, “Both Jess and I have sailed the Sonars previously about six years ago, so our memory of sailing these boats is a bit vague, but we’ve had the last week together as a team to nut out all the action plans and had a few days to work on our boat speed and maneuverability.”
“As a team we’re feeling great,” said Souter. “Our win in Weymouth meant a lot as we received the 24th and final entry into the event and then to back up our win in the Buddy Melges against a lot of the crews from Weymouth was a great confidence boost. “Nina, Olivia and I have welcomed Laura Baldwin into our team and it’s been great having that extra person on board to bring more experience to our team.”
“Our match racing training has been full steam ahead these last few months in Europe and the UK, unfortunately it meant we had little to no time for Sonar training before this week,” she said. “After the Buddy Melges regatta we charted some Sonars for a few days training. With the weather conditions zero to two knots on day one and then up to 20 knots on day two, we have tried to make the most out of the limited conditions as possible.”
While Souter acknowledges there will be pressure on her as defending World Champion she’s looking forward to the challenge ahead of herself Curtis, Price and Baldwin.
“There is always going to be extra pressure being the defending World Champion and winning the last two Women’s Match Racing events, but as we know, the match racing competition is very tough and in the last six World Cups events, we’ve had six winners, and hopefully we can perform as well as we have been these last few months,” said Souter.
With different winners in each of this year’s ISAF World Cup events, and all those champions will be competing at this week’s ISAF Women’s Match Racing World Championship, it will be the most competitive women’s match racing event in memory, and first place is up for grabs.
“The level in women’s match racing has dramatically improved,” says Dave Perry, the US Sailing Team’s match racing coach.
“There’s no real frontrunner.” Perry adds that though the championship is not a scoring event for the World Cup, there will be no better chance to compete against the best sailors.
Regardless of Souter’s recent streak, more than a dozen of the teams competing in the championship have won major events. Claire Leroy won back-to-back ISAF Women’s Match Racing World Championships in 2007 and 2008, as did American Sally Barkow before her in 2004 and 2005. Australian Katie Spithill has been top five in the championship the last three times and is poised to win her first world championship with top results this year.
Leroy’s tuning partner, French sailor Anne-Claire Le Berre, says her team has been training with the expectation that this world championship will be the toughest yet. “Since the Olympic designation, the teams are more professional,” says Le Berre who started match racing in 2004. “This championship is very important to us because it is a world title. We hope to be the best, but there are so many good teams it is difficult to know who will win.”
Not to be discounted is British star Lucy Macgregor, the current ISAF number one ranked women’s match racer. She is third in the ISAF World Cup standings and is sailing with who many consider the top female match racing mind, Annie Lush.
Certainly the most decorated sailors at the event will be Olympic gold medalists Anna Tunnicliffe of the U.S. and Sofia Bekatorou of Greece. Tunnicliffe, who is second in the ISAF World Cup rankings, dove head first into match racing shortly after her Olympic victory in 2008. Bekatorou was a 470 gold medalist in her native Greece in 2004 and has also been slowly climbing the rankings.
With support from their nation’s men’s match racing teams, Portugal, Russia, Denmark, New Zealand and Spain, are all beginning to play the game well and are expected to upset even the top ranked teams.
Though the Olympic class is the Elliot 6 Meter, this year’s championship will be in New York Yacht Club’s fleet of four-person Sonar keelboats. “The Sonars change the playing field a little bit,” says Sally Barkow who has been competing in open match race events over the past several years to gain experience. “Four people change the communication, and it should even things out.”
Le Berre and the other French teams have also been training in Sonars used for Paralympic sailing in France, hoping to gain an advantage in the championship.
As the sailors continue to improve their match racing skills leading up to the 2012 Olympic debut of the discipline, it is early enough for them to take some big risks in order to learn and win. “No team has won consecutive events this year,” says Barkow. “Teams that have won events have missed qualifying for the quarter finals in the next event. It’s anybody’s game.”
Competitors List (with current ISAF ranking):
USA Sally Barkow (12)
Greece Sofia Bekatorou (34)
France Julie Bossard (9)
Portugal Rita Goncalves (25)
France Anne-Claire Le Berre (5)
France Claire Leroy (2)
Great Britain Lucy Macgregor (1)
Denmark Lotte Meldgaard Pedersen (13)
New Zealand Samantha Osborne (18)
Spain Silvia Roca Mata (19)
USA Anna Tunnicliffe (3)
Brazil Juliana Senfft (17)
Russia Ekaterina Skudina (11)
Australia Nicky Souter (8)
Australia Katie Spithill (6)
USA Genny Tulloch (10)
Denmark
