Thanks to Suzanne and Alan for this latest report fro the Extreme 40s racing series. Ed
The opening day ended with two boats dismasting; first Groupama sailing team and then Alinghi. In near perfect sailing conditions the French, with too much load on their rig, were the first to lose their mast during race four. In the seventh and final race of the day, Alinghi suffered the same fate. Both boats were out of the water with a long night in the pitlane ahead.
Meanwhile, Emirates Team New Zealand showed a return to form after their last place in Cardiff two weeks ago, finishing the day tied on 46 points at the top of the leaderboard with the defending Series champions, The Wave, Muscat skippered by Island sailor Leigh McMillan.
Day two
Day two in Istanbul without doubt went to the two Oman Sail teams, with Oman Air clocking up more points than any other boat on the water to climb a massive four places on the leaderboard, and finish the day in third.
Oman Air’s best day of the season couldn’t even be matched by their stablemate and defending champions The Wave, Muscat despite a brilliant showing by Leigh McMillan and the team. This made for a slight gap appearing between them and Emirates Team New Zealand at the top of the leaderboard.
Leigh’s team on The Wave, Muscat have been criticised this year for being slow starters, but in Istanbul they’ve found another gear and quashing that reputation. After racing on day two their tactician and double Olympic champion Sarah Ayton, who we recently met in Cowes, spoke about the team’s focus onboard,
“The first thing is, it’s really close and lots of teams have upped their game so it really isn’t going to be over until that final race on Sunday. But today we had a good day. We approached it with high-energy, and it was a case of doing the basics well. I think overall that’s what we did and it put us in good shape. We’re really focusing on the tempo on the boat, getting good starts and all of those things we’ve been working on throughout the year are all kind of gelling together.”
Day three
Day three and the tankers and cargo ships on one of the world’s busiest shipping channels, the Bosphorus Strait, were replaced with a fleet of Extreme 40s.
Traffic was shut down for a spectacular passage race right through the heart of Istanbul with the yachts navigating the channel and racing past some of Istanbul’s most spectacular Ottoman architecture. This race formed the opener for the day and was followed by the usual series of races ending the day tight at the top of the leaderboard but with Leigh’s team just ahead by two points of the, now on form, New Zealand team.
1st The Wave, Muscat (OMA) Leigh McMillan, Sarah Ayton, Pete Greenhalgh, Kinley Fowler, Nasser Al Mashari 149.
2nd Emirates Team New Zealand (NZL) Dean Barker, Glenn Ashby, James Dagg, Jeremy Lomas, Edwin Delaat 147.
3rd Oman Air (OMA) Rob Greenhalgh, Ted Hackney, Kyle Langford, Hashim Al Rashdi, Musab Al Hadi 133.
4th Alinghi (SUI) Morgan Larson, Stuart Pollard, Pierre-Yves Jorand, Nils Frei, Yves Detrey 130.
In some of the best conditions the fleet have raced in all year the 12 Extreme 40s blasted around the track in 20-23 knots and with the lead changing hands in almost every race. As fortunes swung one way, and then another, Dean Barker and the crew on Emirates Team New Zealand needed to put two boats between them and The Wave, Muscat in the final race to take the win – and they did just that, clinching their first Act win of the year – the first time a team other than Alinghi or The Wave, Muscat have won an Act since 2012.
Narrowing the gap
Despite missing out on top prize in Istanbul, Leigh and the team on The Wave, Muscat did what they went to Istanbul to do – beat Alinghi and narrow the gap on the 2014 rankings.
However, that gave little solace to Leigh who explained:
“It was close points between us and Emirates Team New Zealand, but unfortunately Alinghi obviously didn’t want us to win and so they got in the way during the race and made our life pretty difficult. We’re frustrated, the last two days we’ve sailed really well.
“There are two more Acts, and we’ve beaten Morgan Larson (Alinghi) at the last two, and that’s what we’ve got to keep doing. Second or first at this event, it doesn’t make any difference really because it can come down to Sydney and that’s what we’re focused on.”
Result at Istanbul:
1st Emirates Team New Zealand (NZL) 210 points.
2nd The Wave, Muscat (OMA) 204 points.
3rd Alinghi (SUI) 188 points.
With the penultimate Act of 2014 in Nice just over two weeks away (2-5 October), there will be many lessons learnt by now but rivalries are burning stronger than ever. Alinghi hang onto the overall lead with 55 points but their advantage over The Wave, Muscat has been narrowed to just one point.
Image: © Lloyd Images
