Junior, Youth Master European Championship

The sun came up over the Murcia region of Spain’s Mar Menor today but was obscured by cloud cover. By the deadline of 1400 local time, the wind had failed to stabilise enough for racing to be held on the final day of the EUROSAF High Performance Grand Prix. Because of this, yesterday’s results stand.

The closest finish was in the men’s Kite Cross World Championship where Americans Damien LeRoy and Bryan Lake were tied on points, after Lake had drawn level at the close of play yesterday. Ultimately LeRoy took the championship title, being ahead on countback.

“It was a great week,” said LeRoy. “We had light winds, but we got a lot of races in and there was quite a battle between Bryan and myself. I can’t complain – my first world championship win, that is incredible.” LeRoy’s best result previously was second at the Course World Championship last year. “I had a great time,” he added. “It is a beautiful place. We got a little unlucky with the winds. This place can blow really hard. It is an ideal place to race, for sure.”

The EUROSAF High Performance Grand Prix included the first ever Kite Cross World Championship. However the organisers were experimenting with the course formats and also the rules, which have still to be finalised. “I think it is a good start,” said LeRoy. “We did some tests with different courses in different heats, but what is unique is that we can race in 6-10 knots which is what will help our sport grow and possibly get it into the Olympics.”

Undisputed winner of the women’s Kite Cross World title was France’s Caroline Adrien. Coming from Brest in northwest France, Adrien sailed a perfect series with the exception of the final race yesterday that saw the entire women’s fleet line up. In that race she was beaten by Germany’s Kristin Boese. “It is a very good competition,” said Adrien, who was also the Professional Kiteboard Riders Association World Tour winner this year. “It is a little bit light but it is technical and I am happy.”

Adrien hopes greatly that kiteboarding will be included in the Olympic Games for Rio 2016. “That is my first objective and I stand by for the decision,” she says.

While Adrien’s scoreline was near perfect, Spanish sailor Enrique Cornejo’s results were flawless, posting six bullets in the competition between the A-Class catamarans. However there was disruption to the rest of the podium as two discards came into play today. This saw Mickey Todd elevated to second overall, Spain’s Abdon Ibañez taking third with France’s Thomas Gaveriaux unfortunately dropping off the podium.

For Cornejo, who comes from Barcelona and is considered no2 in the Spanish A-Class fleet, this was the first time he had achieved a perfect scoreline in 18 years of racing the singlehanded catamaran. He said he enjoyed sailing alongside the F18s, 29erXXs and kiteboards.

With eight bullets in nine races, double Olympic medallist Mitch Booth and Miguel Perez dominated the F18 catamaran to finish ahead of Michael ten Bokun/Enrique Ortiz with Marc Verdaguer/Alberto Torner third.

“It is great to see this style of event gaining momentum,” said Booth of the EUROSAF High Performance Grand Prix. “It is attracting the youth, which is something you don’t see so much in other events, particularly in Olympic sailing where it is the seasoned campaigners who are always at events.” Also competing in the F18 this week was Booth’s 14-year-old son Jordi, who finished fifth sailing with Sergio Cadenas.

“We talked about taking some of the ideas and experimental courses such as the ones we used in the Volvo Champions Race, which were a huge success: shorter courses, very very close to the dock, downwind starts, a couple of speed runs - we tried this two lane speed course where you went down the course and took the gate and then came back and finished on the opposite side, so you had to cross over.” In general Booth says it is about getting both competitors and spectators enthusiastic about sailing.  “It is all moving towards more fun, more entertainment, a more spectator-friendly style of racing. We are happy to support it,” he concluded.

With four bullets in nine races and only finishing off the podium twice, the 29erXX series belonged to Danes Ida Marie Baad Nielsen and Marie Thusgaard Olsen. France’s Kévin Fischer and Marion Leprunier ended up second with the Danish/Dutch crew of Lin Cenholt and Kaj Böcker third.

“We had very good boat speed, we were very fast upwind and I think that is the reason,” said Olsen of why they won. “If you were in the lead at the top mark it was easy.” The Danes have also used the excellent facility at the Centro de Alto Rendimento – Infanta Cristina three times in the past for winter training, so they had past experience of the Mar Menor. “We also have a very good set up for the mast,” her helm added. “We don’t know why it is good but I think that is the reason we are so fast upwind.” Certainly coming from Denmark’s Aarhus Sailing Club, where there is a strong 49er squad including Beijing gold medallist Jonas Warrer, helped as they regularly advise the girls on their boat set-up.

The 29erXX class was particularly experimental in trying out new course formats this week. Nielsen said she particularly liked the slalom courses but felt that the Seiko Speed Challenge was unfair because running it one boat at a time, the wind varied between runs.

Organiser of the EUROSAF High Performance Grand Prix Rafa González said he was happy with how this first event had gone, even though at the start of the event he had been nervous about a potential lack of wind. He confirmed that both EUROSAF and the Murcia government have agreed to hold the event again in 2012, however he has yet to finalise a date.  All the classes that came this year have been invited back for 2012 and the kiteboards have suggested that one of their European championships be held in conjunction with the event next year.

“I would very much like to thank Nautivela, Magic Marine, Murcia and the Municiality of Los Alcazares,” said González.

Marco Predieri, President of EUROSAF, added: “Just another regatta was not what we wanted. In association with the Region de Murcia and the Real Federacion Española de Vela, EUROSAF were very excited to have the opportunity of organising a new type of sailing event, from which the High Performance Grand Prix was created. This is something very different for the sailing world. We have brought together diverse sailing disciplines in kiteboarding, foiling, multihulls and skiffs, and created a single competition for these very different branches of the sport of sailing. The event has met all our expectations and more, and we look forward to organising it again in 2012, back here in Murcia.”

For more information – www.sailingmurcia.com

Photos are to be found at www.nicomartinez.com

Video can be downloaded from

server : ftp-3.panoramaproducciones.com
user : pano100
password  : eurosaf2011

and can also be viewed here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQfkiTO6qKI

Lake and LeRoy neck and neck at the Kite Cross World Championship

For the kiteboards competing for their inaugural Kite Cross World Championship it was a long day, completing four rounds and concluding the day with full fleet races for the men and women.

In the Women’s class, the unbroken run of bullets for France’s Caroline Adrien came to an end in the fleet race when she was beaten by Germany’s Kristin Boese.

Boese, who is campaigning hard to get kiteboarding adopted for Rio 2016 in place of the RS:X sailboards, was delighted with her win and now has a firm hold on second place overall, the EUROSAF High Performance Grand Prix marking her return to the race course for a while. Boese has been kiteboarding for 10 years and in the past has twice won the Freestyle World Championship and twice the Course World Championship. “It is fun to be here and to see that I can still control the board and I can still do it. With the slalom being quite a new discipline, I think it is a good thing for the sport, so I wanted to support this event. It is great to see that we can be part of a sailing event and they are welcoming kiteboarding.”

Boese says she prefers the shorter courses of the World Championship they are sailing here. “As an athlete it is more fun. It is also faster and more exciting and more things are happening on the course and it is more spectator friendly.”

Among the men Miami-based Damien LeRoy's lead is in jeopardy as he is now on equal points in first place with San Francisco-based Bryan Lake. The inter-American battle for first went to the limit today when their kites became entangled on the second heat.

“It was definitely his fault!” said LeRoy. “Truthfully there were four of us flying into a corner. Both Bryan and I took a high line at the start and we had the advantage, but the wind shifted so we had a disadvantage and we rounded the first marked seventh and eighth. On the next gybe I went from eighth to second and he went from seventh to third and on the next turn a guy in front of me dropped his kite, so I had to turn my kite and Bryan looped his kite through mine. The truth is – that’s racing. There wasn’t fault. We got into a bunch up and it just happened that Bryan and I ended up swimming together.”

Still hanging on to third behind the Americans is France’s Bruno Stoka. Stoka was World Champion in 2007, World Cup winner in 2009-10 and three times European champion, but in recent years in addition to his competing he has started undertaking more grandiose projects. In April 2008 he kiteboarded around Cape Horn and now he is working on a project for the two kidnapped journalists in Afghanistan.

Coming from Brest in northwest France Stoka says that there they regularly get 100 kiteboards competing and they hold a similar format of racing they call Speed Crossing, albeit not on courses as short as the ones at this World Championship. He was not very pleased with his performance today. “I started very well and now today, I was not very lucky. Some guys push their kite on mine, so I couldn’t take the start as I’d like.”

As to the EUROSAF High Performance Grand Prix he says: “It is funny to organise something with the boats. It is a laboratory. We need to learn something. We can progress this format, because at the moment we don’t have any rules. Racing with the boats is fun. Normally we don’t come across sailing people.”

The EUROSAF High Performance Grand Prix concludes tomorrow.

Speed trials for the 29erXXs and Moths

The 29erXX fleet held three more windward-leewards today. The jury has ruled that yesterday’s experimental slalom courses will be scored separately from today and Thursday’s results, but this has made little difference to the podium where the Danes still dominate with Ida Marie Baad Nielsen and Marie Thusgaard Olsen extending their lead after their two bullets today with Lin Cenholt and her Dutch stand-in crew Kaj Böcker third and France’s Kevin Fischer and Marion Leprunier back in second.

Germany has a strong 29erXX entry at the EUROSAF High Performance Grand Prix, fielding four teams. Leading these, in fourth place overall, are the 18 year old twins Jule and Lotte Görge, who herald from Kieler Yacht Club. They got into the 29erXX this season having previously sailed the standard rigged skiff for three and a half years, during which time they were twice German Champions. In anticipation of the women’s two person skiff for Rio 2016, they have a five year sponsorship deal with car manufacturer BMW. Jule, two minutes the younger of the twins, says she and her sister will move into whichever women’s two person skiff is chosen for the Games in five year’s time, even if it is not the 29erXX.

In the Seiko Speed Challenge for the 29erXXs, the Görges posted the second fastest time behind Spain’s Vernon Cerdan Ming/Alex Torrado, who win the US$500 prize money courtesy of the Swiss watch manufacturer.

The Moths also took part in the speed trial where Pro-Vela’s Alan Hillman just failed to make 20 knots while Finland’s Janne Riihela managed 20.7. Riihela normally sails an F18 and only bought his Mach One foiling Moth in May. To get to the EUROSAF High Performance Grand he drove all the way down from his home one hour north of Helsinki with his boat on the roof. Riihela admits that he has some way to go to get used to the Moth after the stability of the catamaran he is used to. “I am completely out of control! The original idea was to sail on the same course at the 29ers, but I couldn’t do it. If I had to start giving people way I would die! The idea was to come and learn from Alan.” That he beat Hillman he acknowledges was something of a fluke. “There was not a lot of breeze and the adjustment of the boat is incorrect so when I was reaching 18 knots, the boat was starting to go up and down and starting to crash into the water

Leaders unbeatable in the catamarans

Today the breeze was at its best yet on the Mar Menor for the EUROSAF High Performance Grand as under the burning sun there were gusts of up to 15 knots. With the wind expected to be at its maximum for this unique regatta for the kiteboards, skiffs, foilers and catamarans, so the 29ers, F18s and Moths took the opportunity hold speed trials.

In the singlehanded A-Class catamaran Spain’s Enrique Cornejo continued to dominate adding four more bullets his two yesterday. While the 17 strong fleet is mostly Spanish, local sailmaker Mickey Todd is originally from Largs in Scotland and well known in the UK as part of Lawrie Smith’s Ultra 30 crew and in the International 14 and 18ft skiff fleet. For the last 10 years he has been based close to Cartegena where he runs Hammer Sails and the accessories company A Cat Kit, both businesses specialising in the A-Class.

Todd started the day in second and scored a second in the last race but was deeper in the stronger winds early on today when he says he lacked pace downwind aboard his DNA catamaran. This has dropped him to fourth overall. “Sometimes I was going deep with both hulls in the water - that seemed to work, but when they get the hull flying, they zoom away. Upwind I was always in the top three at the windward mark.”

A regular with the local A-Class fleet, the Mar Menor is home port for Todd who says he is surprised more Olympic teams don’t base themselves at the Centro de Alto Rendimento – Infanta Cristina, the giant yacht club/sports centre where the EUROSAF High Performance Grand Prix is held. “I don’t even think that even Palma is as safe a place to sail,” he says.

Similar to Cornejo, in the F18 Mitch Booth and Miguel Perez are looking unbeatable. Holding on to second are Dutch helm, Michael ten Bokum, and his Spanish crew, Enrique Ortiz. “We have got someone to show us the way,” says ten Bokum in reference to Booth, the double Tornado Olympic medallist. Today there was enough wind to require the F18 crews to trapeze off the transom on the downwind legs.

Ten Bokum and Ortiz, who only started sailing their Hobie Wildcat this season, managed to consistently finish in second place in today’s three races despite breaking a daggerboard on the last leg of the second race. “The event is good fun with a good group of 29ers and the kitesurfers,” says ten Bokum. “It is a good holiday here, good conditions and an excellent place to sail and it is good to give the high performance classes a push.”

Later in the afternoon the F18s took part in a speed trial where Ten Bokum and Ortiz came out on top ahead of Marc Verdaguer and Alberto Torner.