London 2012 day 3: Better day for the Brits

Percy extends as Ben pulls up as Ireland's Annalise Murphy gets four straight bullets

49ers

The 49ers moved onto the Portland Harbour course today, which typically enjoyed stronger winds and flat water, but in a southwest is a little awkward once again being in the lee of Portland.

In the opening race it was New Zealand’s Peter Burling and Blair Tuke who led the fleet around the course. At the first mark they led Canada’s Gordon Cook and Hunter Lowden and Finland’ Lauri Lehtinen and Kalle Bask with the Aussie leader Nathan Outteridge and Iain Jensen fourth and Brits Stevie Morrison and Ben Rhodes sixth.

Down the run the dominant Aussies pulled up to second and with the Brits up to fourth. Despite the Aussies once again doing well out to the left of the second beat, the Kiwis managed to remainjust ahead of them with Morrison and Rhodes up to third. The Kiwis keeping their noses clean on the second run with the Brits and Aussie jockeying for second with them splitting at the gate, the Aussies heading left once again. This made no difference with the Kiwis maintaining their lead through to the finish with the Brits scoring their best result of their series in third.

Race 2 saw Irelands’ Ryan Seaton and Matthew McGovern and the USA’s Erik Storck and Trevor Moore round the top mark in unison with the Aussies up to third, the Kiwis fifth and the Brits in seventh. The Aussies and Brits gybed early and so it was that Outteridge and Jensen moved into the lead at the gate with the Iker Martinez and Xabi Fernandez up to fourth ahead of the Brits. The Aussies extended away up the next beat and the down the next run.

At the second gate mark there was disaster when while in sixth place Morrison and Rhodes capsized.

Morrison explained: “The Spanish and the Kiwis had split and that meant we had to take avoiding action on the Kiwis, which meant they had a lot of control over us and were pinning us into the bottom mark. So we had to do a simultaneous gybe with them which we did fine, but as we came out of the gybe your first step is to get your foot back into the foot loop and as I was stepping back we hit their wind shadow which meant it slowed up, and my foot wasn’t in, so I swung forward and knocked him [Ben Rhodes] off like a skittle and that was that – got a bit wet!”

Meanwhile the Aussies extended away with the Americans and Irish comfortably holding second and third. And this is how it seemed it would pan out until unexpectedly coming into the finish the Brits were followed by the Aussies in the ‘getting wet’ club.

Outteridge explained: “We were going downwind and we were having a chat about our last gybe and when we went in I just lost balance a bit and pushed the tiller the wrong way with my foot, I ended up too far back and, instead of continuing the turn, my foot rounded the boat back up and I fell out of the back and Goobs [Jensen] did a good job - he got the kite down before the mast hit the water and we got it up before we were hoping anyone saw!”

While the Brits plummeted from fifth to 18th in recovering from their capsize, incredibly the Aussies got their boat upright and crossed the line fourth, with the US team taking the bullet ahead of the Irish and with the Spanish third.

“We had a pretty big lead, so we had a lot of open space to just get it up and get going, whereas when the Brits capsized that was at the second bottom mark and that’s where the race all happens - if you go over there are no passing lanes after that,” said Outteridge.

Generally of the day the Aussie helm said: “It was great sailing conditions and we sailed really well. We had two good starts and went the right way up the first beat and chipped away with some really good boat speed and great gate roundings to set us up for the next beat. It was almost a perfect day for us until the end. It was 14-18 knots. It was perfect for 49ers.”

Of their day Stevie Morrison said: “We are sailing the boat really well. It felt like we were the fastest boat on the water. We were pretty conservative at the starts and we got some really good results. I felt we had a second or a third in us in that second race which would have meant a very good day but as disappointing as the capsize is, all you can do it look at the positives and they are we are sailing well and we are sailing fast. We have got more races left than Ben Ainslie and Iain Percy had at the start of their regatta. We are doing a lot of right things. There is a lot of our jigsaw that are in really good shape to do well tomorrow.”

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