Thanks to Suzanne and Alan for this update on Island sailor Leigh McMillan. Ed
Entries for Act 7, presented by Land Rover, included one from the home nation -the ‘ALL4ONE Racing Team’. This Act was about putting valuable points on the leaderboard to set the teams up for the final clash in Florianópolis, Brazil.
Isle of Wight sailor Leigh McMillan, skipper of The Wave, Muscat, had battled his way to the top of the Series leaderboard before racing in Nice having won four of the five Acts this year. Leigh managed to put one point between his team and longstanding Series rivals Alinghi during the UK leg in Cardiff over the August Bank Holiday weekend.
A crucial race
Before racing in Nice Leigh said,
“Nice is absolutely crucial going into Brazil. We need to stay within a point of Alinghi but in the worst-case scenario it will come down to who-beats-who in Brazil. Generally speaking when the pressure is on, we rise to the challenge.”
Came out in great style
On day one there were 20 knots of breeze with gusts over 25 knots seeing the eight Extreme 40s hurtle around the open water on the Bay of Angels.
This big breeze suited Leigh’s Omani team who came out in great style, winning four of the eight races, stamping an early authority on the Nice leaderboard and with Leigh saying, “It is going to be really difficult to repeat a day like today”.
Events during the exciting racing included the Danish SAP Extreme Sailing Team skilfully managing to bring their Extreme 40 back from the brink but suffering race-ending damage in the process.
Swiss teams Alinghi and Realteam both secured two race wins apiece.
Scoreboard
After Day 1 (8 races) results were:
1st The Wave, Muscat (OMA) 71 points.
2nd Alinghi (SUI) 61 points.
3rd Realteam (SUI) 58 points.
Day 2 saw the fleet go into Stadium mode, racing just metres from the shore on the Promenade des Anglais and with winds of over 25 knots there were six action packed races.
Leigh’s team were unflappable extending their lead by 17 points over the Swiss- Alinghi. Calling the tactics for the Swiss in Nice was Olympic champion Anna Tunnicliffe who transferred her skills from the Olympic racecourse to the Extreme 40 stadium.
Points were now: 1st The Wave, Muscat -125, 2nd Alinghi-107 and 3rd Red Bull Sailing Team (AUT) 98.
Tense racing
There was a change of pace on the penultimate day’s racing when the big winds abated to be replaced with a much fresher breeze that played across the Bay of Angels, testing the teams tactical aptitude.
Battle on the water for the eight Extreme 40s was tense. The Wave, Muscat showed that there were very few chinks in their armour, adding two more race wins to their tally and showing just how good they are in both the light and stronger breeze.
Skipper Leigh said, back on dock:
“It was really hard to adjust to the light conditions; we were struggling a little bit to get back into the light wind mode after two pretty exciting windy days. We were fighting hard all the time just to get everything to click into place.
“We’ve had three solid days so far but we just need to keep doing the same things and not think too much about the overall scores here. The bigger picture is to keep knocking away at the overall points for the season – which is what we’ll keep doing tomorrow.”
Double points final race
The Wave, Muscat now had 189 points with Alinghi on 161 points and Red Bull Sailing Team on 155 points.
After some very exciting racing on the last day of Act 7 Leigh and his crew of Pete Greenhalgh, Ed Smyth, Musab Al Hadi and Hashim Al Rashdi had an unassailable lead going into the all important double points final race, but the battle for second was raging behind them with Red Bull Sailing Team having a one point advantage over Alinghi.
With the Swiss and Austrians marking each other around the track there was a lot happening and a lot of other races within the main race. Ultimately a fourth place for Alinghi was enough for them to overhaul Red Bull Sailing Team.
A near faultless regatta
At the end of the regatta Leigh’s team had sailed a near faultless regatta and the crew of The Wave, Muscat were crowned champions of Act7.
Leigh enthused,
“To come out the back of four days racing unscathed is pretty rare! We were able to put in a consistent performance and we try to keep it fun at the same time. It has been a great event, we pushed it and sailed extremely well.”
Final Positions
1st The Wave, Muscat 237 points.
2nd Alinghi 217 points.
3rd Red Bull Sailing Team 216 points.
Next stop on the global tour is Florianopolis, Brazil 14-17 November – an unknown Host Venue for the fleet where four days of racing and over 30 races will decide the 2013 champion.
