Report from Dee O’Rourke in Marseille
Wednesday in Marseille and the outstanding but windless sunny weather led to the race committee deciding to hoist the AP flag (postponement of racing) at 10am this morning on the dock leaving the crews to enjoy the city centre of Marseille until 12.30, when the sea breeze kicked in leaving enough time to run two races today.
RACE 1:
This was a 2 lap windward leeward that found the crew of the ‘3 Mobile’ sponsored CIT team off the line in flying form and rounding the first windward mark in 7th with the Italians, USA and Swiss out ahead. The downwind leg saw CIT hot on the heels of the rest of the fleet. After gaining on the Czech Republic CIT capitalized on this and went on to position themselves well on the next beat taking out the Swiss on the second windward rounding. CIT went on to take the USA on the downwind leg and finished in second place. Three boats were OCS in this race and were disqualified: France(Aud), England and University of Limerick
RACE 2:
This time the Race Committee sent the fleet on a small 10 mile inshore coastal race around the island of Iles du Frioul, this time taking all the rocks and island to port, unlike Monday when the teams took the island to starboard. The leading team of the Italians had a bad start in this race and were in eighth at the first mark but failed to make any significant gains and finished in third place. CIT had a good start and were off the line with speed and went to hold this position for the first quarter of the race. But with the ever changing wind conditions and the sea breeze increasing slightly, the crew of CIT went on to lose out on a major lift, causing them to lose positions. After the teams rounded the island and headed downwind the fleet had separated out and there was a breakaway fleet of 6 boats out ahead. 3 mobile CIT was amongst this group along with the Swiss, Italians and French. England had a blinder of a day and led the fleet around the inshore course. CIT narrowly lost the battle by a boat length of the forward fleet and finished in 6th position. UL finished in 9th place.
Overall rankings after 10 races and with two discards applied:
Italy 11 points
Czech Republic 29
Cork Institute of Technology 30 points
France (Aud) 31 points
USA 31 points
Switzerland 35 points
England 40 points
Scotland 50 points
University of Limerick 64 points
Wales 64 points
France (Poly) 70 points
Japan 81 points
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