The Dublin-based pair's consistent form has been the dominating factor in the Irish aspect a competition that has challenged even the greats of Star racing to post consistent results.
Royal St George YC sailors Treacy/Shanks posted a 26th yesterday in gusty, shifty conditions that saw five attempts at a start before the fleet got away under a black flag. Two more masts would fall by the end of the race (total tally - nine masts so far) as the wind velocity fluctuated from 8 to 20 knots.
O'Connell/Cooke fell victim to the black flag, being called out of the fleet at the windward mark along with six other offenders. With only one discard in the six-race event, a second black flag puts paid to their qualification attempts, leaving O'Leary/Milne and Treacy/Shanks to battle it out for the Beijing slot.
With just one day and one race to go, you'd have to agree with Prof. Treacy/Shanks are sitting pretty in 14th overall, and are placed third of the four nations looking for qualification at this World Championships. The two top Irish boats are separated by 31 points going into the final day, a gulf that will be hard to bridge for the Corkmen (lying 22nd), and would surely require a combination of superhuman sailing on their part and some sudden misfortune on the part of Treacy/Shanks.
It's interesting to note that had the youngsters not broken their mast in race 4 and held on to finish in the top five, they could now expect to be on 65 points net overall - exactly the same as Treacy/Shanks' current tally. They won't thank us for pointing that out, but what a final race that would have made.
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