Conor Clarke's Irish entry Embarr is fifth overall on 34 points but only two points off second place overall at the Melges World Sailing Championships in Corpus Christi Bay, Texas. Pics, video below.
Yesterday was another another breezy but a little more overcast day. "It's extraordinary to be racining in shorts deck shoes, rash vests and buoyancy in such fresh breeze but the water and air temperatures are seriously hot, according to Spi trimmer, Prof O'Connell.
Ireland's Embarr gets a great start
The Irish crew had a tough day yesterday against some professional sailing teams.
"Uka Uka Racing", steered by 470 Olympian Lorenzo Bressani with gold medallist Jonathan McKee calling tactics now has an almost unassailable lead on the event, having scored two bullets again today and has nine points.
Brian Porter steering "Full Throttle" with tactician Andy Burdick from Melges Yachts is second on 33 points.
Alec Cutler steering the 2009 World Champion boat "Hedgehog", with Olympic silver medallist Mike Wolfs aboard is third on 33 points.
Kristen Lane, with assistance from gold medallist Charlie McKee on "Brick House 812" in fourth on 34 points.
Clarke is fifth on 34 points - two points off second place.
'Our day today, upon reflection could have been a lot worse', says Prof O'Connell, 'we could have had two DNF's' He takes up the story here:
'The stainless steel lower gudgeon which holds our rudder to the back of the boat shattered with an enormous BANG today whilst doing 15 knots down the first run. Thus we had a diminishing amount of control over the boat as the race went on and we fought hard to nurse the boat around the course. In order to tack, he had to sheet the main on hard to help the boat turn and then a massive physical effort from the team to keep the boat flat upwind and downwind was needed. Gybes were also risky and we lost three boats on the last gybe into the finish to get 8th place in that race.
Using some vectran and spectra lines, we lashed the rudder to the transom gudgeon after the race and got ready for race 8. We nailed the start out of the port end, minimised the tacks and gybes and battled around the course to nab a 3rd on the line. Our competitors thought that we had discovered this fabulous "low mode" downwind but the fact was that we couldn't "heat up" as much as the other boats downwind for fear of breaking the rudder.
Our 8,3 scoreline for the day leaves us STILL within a point of second overall. We so could be sitting pretty in a comfortable second overall now but that's' "if's buts and maybe's" isn't it!"
Top Five Overall
1. Uka Uka Racing - Lorenzo Bressani, ITA, 9 points
2. Full Throttle - Brian Porter, USA, 33
3. hedgehog - Alec Cutler, BER, 33
4. Brick House 812 - Kristen Lane, USA, 34
5. Embarr - Nathan Wilmot, IRL, 34
Top Five Corinthian
1. Esprit - Eiichiro Hamazaki, JPN, 7
2. Unsponsored - Christof Wieland, GER, 18
3. Rosebud - Scott Holmgren, USA, 24
4. High Voltage - August Hernandez, USA, 27
5. Funtech Racing - Charlie Hess, USA, 34
Racing runs through until Saturday 21 May.
