SYWoC UL Blog: Katie Unable to Sail

26th October 2009

Day Two: UL's Cian Gallagher and Conor Martin update from the Student World Championship in Marseilles: Today we got off to a bad start with our skipper Katie being unable to sail due to a vomiting bug. So with a bit of shifting around Darragh took over the helm for today's racing. On arriving to the race area conditions appeared a lot better then yesterday with a steady 10-15 knots of breeze.

The first race was a coastal race starting in Marseille harbour before going around the Iles de Frioul, just off the coast. A good start and solid first beat saw us in 5th position at the top mark. With the rest of the fleet behind us, we decided to take an early gybe into cleaner air, which turned out to be detrimental to the race after the wind filled in for the rest of the fleet powerin them ahead. By the next mark we saw ourselves in 11th position. Things didn't get any better for the rest of the race and with a few tactical errors we ended up finishing the race in last position.

In the second race we had a solid start but our boat speed on the beat was lacking when we realised something was trailing from the rudder. Still we managed to round the top mark of the windward leeward course in 7th and held on to this position for the rest of the race with tough competition from the Czechs downwind.

The third race began immediately after the second had ended with another two lap windward leeward. Again, we had a very strong start but as per the other two races we struggled with boat speed, losing out on the upwind legs. We held our place well downwind but that was not enough to make up the places needed. We eventually finished in 9th place after a long and painful day on the water.

We look forward to tomorrow, returning to our own positions, with Katie back on form and ready to sail again. The conditions are still looking light until wednesday, and with the night race is planned for tomorrow evening along with 2 races before, it should make an interesting day. Wish us luck...

PS. We are having trouble updating our website from here, so check in with afloat.ie each night

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