Day one of the SB20 World Championships opened with a grey day and raining in Hyeres, France, something the locals refuse to call normal at this time of the year.
Unfortunately, there are no Irish boats competing in the 65-boat world championship fleet this year.
The unstable wind added disappointment to the fleet when the Race Officer Natalie Peberel announced at skippers briefing the maximum of four races today.
When the fleet arrived at the starting line by 11:00 the 30 degrees shifts didn't allow to call racing and it took about 40 minutes for the RC to call Race 1. It has started at a slow pace with light wind of 5-6 knots from the South.
After a bit of waiting, the RC called Race 2, that started wit ha general recall. On the first upwind almost at the rounding of the first boats November flag was displayed, sending the boats back to the starting line. The wind has stopped completely, and after boats got back to the start the AP over H was displayed which meant the RC was still hoping for racing today.
Overall for the opening day the strong lead is from Russian and Australian teams, Portuguese boats Dom Pedro & Animal/SailCascais chose the left side and despite that Vasco Serpa managed to finish 15th.
The all-female Youth team from Australia - Essence of Athena had a good start and were within top 15 boats on the first rounding.
Overall in Top 10 we see a strong Russian and Australian domination with the only UK boat being Breaking Bod of Charles Whelan.
For the coming days, the fleet are expecting a storm coming with winds up to 40 knots on Wednesday, so Tuesday's racing is likely to be pushed earlier in the day to try and catch some racing in the morning.
Results here
