A black flag disqualification may not have been the best start to Olympic qualification for Dublin 49er duo Robert Dickson and Sean Waddilove at the Allianz Sailing World Championships at The Hague in the Netherlands on Friday, but the Howth-Skerries duo showed the depth of their ambition by bouncing back with a second in race two. 

As Afloat reported previously, six Irish boats will be in action for ten days, where places for Paris 2024 are up for grabs but conditions are tricky with fluctuating winds and strong tidal currents.

The skiff classes started the series, and the Irish Tokyo 2020 representatives appeared to have nailed their first race start along with the Dutch training partners and defending world champions until the dreaded black flag was applied to the Irish hopes.

The Cork 49er crew Seafra Guilfoyle with Johnny Durcan of the Royal Cork Yacht Club delivered two top-half fleet results for their first day with up to six further races remaining to decide the crucial Gold, Silver and Bronze fleet splits where a top ten result will be required to take a Paris place.

Royal Cork 49er crew of Seafra Guilfoyle with Johnny Durcan of the Royal Cork Yacht Club are racing in The Hague Photo: World Sailing

After three races sailed, Dickson and Waddilove lie 24th and Guilfoyle and Johnny Durcan 59th in the 83-boat fleet.

Ten nations, excluding France, will qualify for Paris, and nations have a rooting interest in other nations from their continent as a quirk of the qualifying system. For example, if China and Korea were to finish in their current positions, they would not need to qualify at the next stage, the continental qualification, opening up greater opportunities for other Asian nations. The case is likewise in the Americas and Oceania, which will all have teams on the bubble of Olympic qualifying. The International 49er class has rated Dickson and Waddilove's chances of qualifying as 'on the bubble' as Afloat reports here.

American prowess

America's Nevin Snow and Mac Agnese (USA) won two of their three qualifying races to share the overall lead as their American teammates are also each in the top twelve, setting up the USA well for Olympic Qualifying.

America's Nevin Snow and Mac Agnese (USA) won two of their three qualifying races at the World Sailing Championships Photo: World Sailing

Snow is the US college sailor of the year and has had flashes of brilliance in the 49er but also an up-and-down career so far. In teaming up with Mac Agenese, a member of the 2019 America’s Cup American Magic Team, he’s formed a stable partnership and an upward trajectory on his Olympic sailing career.

Also winning two races were Diego Botin with Florian Tritell (ESP), fresh off their seminal Sail GP win, to sit tied with the Americans on two points overall.

Three teams are tied for third at this early stage, with Wang/Qi (CHN), Fantela brothers (CRO), and Przbytek/Piasecki (POL) each on four points. 19 nations sit within the 25-place cutoff for gold fleet, showing the increasing depth of 49er racing globally. Asia has had its best-ever day in the 49er, with China, Korea, Hong Kong, Japan, and India all making the gold fleet standard. Asia has been purchasing 40% of the world’s 49ers since 2012, and as the depth and focus have improved, now the results are too.

Meanwhile, a female Irish 49erFX debuted on the women's course with Erin McIlwaine (Ballyhome Yacht Club) with Ellie Cunnane (Tralee Bay Sailing Club), completing their first three races at senior level.

Irish interest continues with the skiff events on Saturday.

Results are here

All 10 Olympic classes will be competing in the 2023 Sailing World Championships in The Hague over the next week. The 49er, 49erFX and Nacra 17 all began on Friday (11 August), with the Nacra 17 Medal race on Thursday 17 and the skiff medal races next Friday 19 August.

This is the first opportunity to qualify for Paris 2024, and the International 49er Class Association has taken a deep dive into the fleets to predict who is most likely to grab the spots.

Among the Irish sailors in the Netherlands are 49er pair Robert Dickson and Sean Waddilove, no doubt looking to top their performance in last month’s Paris 2024 test event.

And the international class has taken notice, rating the duo as ‘on the bubble’ and saying they “are at times right at the front of the action, but are also highly inconsistent. Will we see them at their best?” More on the Worlds predictions HERE.

So far, the most unpredictable class of the Paris 2024 Test competition has been the 49er, with six winners in as many races, including an Irish win for Robert Dickson and Sean Waddilove in Race 3.

Isaac McHardie and William McKenzie (NZL) took the final win of the second day of action, and that was enough to move into top spot, ahead of Sébastien Schneiter and Arno De Planta (SUI) on countback, with the pair both on 27 points.

However, with the next four teams all sitting between 30 and 32 points, including third place for Mihovil and Sime Fantela (CRO), the 2018 world champions, the Kiwis are well aware of the precarious nature of their position heading into the rest day.

McHardie said: “It was a super tricky day, it was unbelievably shifty with big puffs and big lulls so it was all about getting off the start line, it was a bit of a left-hand track, so you needed a good start, and then go left, that made for an ok race.

“I’m sure there will always be a target on the back, but we’ll go out there and race our best. It’s not a bad place to be coming into a rest day. It was always about coming here to do the best we can, so to come into a lay-day in first, we’re pretty stoked.”

The 49er fleet has a scheduled day off on Thursday as the ten fleets share 4-course areas in this Field of Play Test.

More from the 49er class association here and a (glitchy) results link here

Irish 49er duo Robert Dickson and Sean Waddilove scored a race victory in the opening races of the Paris 2024 Olympic Sailing Test Event.

Mihovil and Sime Fantela (CRO) also enjoyed a strong start on the opening day of the 49er competition, a first and third giving them a three-point advantage over three pairs tied on seven points.

Those are reigning world champions Bart Lambriex and Floris van de Werken (NED), Sebastien Schneiter and Arno De Planta (SUI), and Isaac McHardie and William McKenzie (NZL).

The remaining two victories on the day were taken by James Peters and Fynn Steritt (GBR), and Dickson and Waddilove (IRL), who sit ninth and 10th, respectively overall.

Results are here

Tokyo 2020 Olympians Robert Dickson (Howth Yacht Club) with Sean Waddilove (Skerries Sailing Club) return to competition in the 49er Men's skiff event at Allianz Regatta in The Netherlands this week after a period of illness and a year after achieving a podium result at the same event.

As Afloat reported last year, Ireland's top-ranked skiff pair fought off French competition to win the 49er medal race and win their first World Cup silver medal at the 2022 event.

More recently, however, the pair have struggled with speed issues, so the 2023 Allianz Regatta will be an important test just months before the Paris 2024 Olympic qualification event in August.

They told supporters recently: "Some big ups and downs for us at this year's Princess Sofia. We headed into Gold Fleet in the overall lead but struggled to perform in the lighter winds".

Royal Cork Yacht Club's Seafra Guilfoyle and Johnny Durcan will also compete. The Crosshaven pair aim to improve their starting processes and can expect up to 12 races over the next five days.

Lighter winds brought improved performances for both Irish 49er campaigns at French Olympic Sailing Week but not enough to secure a gold fleet (or top third of 72) berth in Hyeres. 

Robert Dickson (Howth Yacht Club) with Sean Waddilove (Skerries Sailing Club) (lying 31st) took third place in their opening race of the day. A tenth place followed in their second race though only after they lost a few places on the second last leg of the course.

Seafra Guilfoyle with Johnny Durcan (Royal Cork Yacht Club) (42nd) topped their qualification round with a fourth place but only after a 21st in the opening race of the day. A collision at the start of the race left them playing catch-up.

New Zealand’s Logan Dunning Beck & Oscar Gunn

New Zealand’s Logan Dunning Beck & Oscar Gunn, winners in Palma at the beginning of April, reclaimed the overall lead after winning their last race in yellow fleet. They overtook the leading USA boat, Ian Barrows & Hans Henken, who showed they are not just big wind specialists with 4, 6 finishes in the yellow fleet as others struggled around them.

The Dutch world champions Bart Lambriex & Floris van der Werken only slipped a place to third but finished 9, 11 in the blue fleet.

The other big risers were Australia’s Jim Colley & Shaun Connor (1, 2 in red fleet) and USA’s Kevin Snow & Mac Agnese, who won both blue fleet’s races to move into the top ten.

Results are here

After a 24-hour delay to racing, the Irish 49er Olympic skiffs finally went afloat at French Olympic Week today (Tuesday, 25th April 2023), but both were battered by the continuing strong mistral winds at Hyeres. 

Robert Dickson (Howth Yacht Club) and Seán Waddilove (Skerries Sailing Club) scored a 16th in the opening race and took a tenth in the second, but a capsize in the final race of the day left the pair counting a 'Did Not Finish', plus an injured wrist for Dickson into the bargain.

Royal Cork Yacht Club's Séafra Guilfoyle with Johnny Durcan were on track for a top-six result in when they capsized close to the finish in the second race. They managed to right themselves quickly and went on to place 15th. They were scored DNC in the third.

Robert Dickson (left) and Seán Waddilove

The Med’s famous Mistral pushed the sailors to their limits and beyond on day 2. Glorious sunshine and 23-knot+ westerlies building throughout the day and gusting towards 30 welcomed the fleets in the Bay of Hyères.

The Dutch did the double at the World Championships in Nova Scotia last September, winning both the FX and the 49er. And Bart Lambriex & Floris van der Werken matched their female compatriots on day 2 by also finishing the day handily in second place overall after winning the first and last of their three races (and finishing 1, 2, 1) in yellow fleet - one of the three.

Fresh from their victory in Palma at the beginning of April, New Zealand’s Logan Dunning Beck & Oscar Gunn matched the Dutch by winning their last two races in red fleet to finish 2, 1, 1.

Just behind them, France’s Kévin Fischer & Yann Jauvin, were the dominant boat in blue fleet, finishing 2, 6, 1. “It was a tough day today,” Fischer said. “We managed to negotiate this wind and steep and short chop well and have stayed in the frame. We made one small error when the spinnaker halyard came out of the cleat, but we managed to limit the damage by only finishing sixth.”

But for some crews it was a very welcome and rare chance to show off their big wind talent in an international regatta. USA had two crews consistently at the front of their two fleets and Ian Barrows & Hans Henken, (who won the American domestic trials and will represent USA at the Test Event in Marseille)

“Ian and I love these conditions,” Henken said. “We were bummed not to sail yesterday. We train all the time in this in California, in San Francisco, we do a lot in the ocean in Miami. The French are really fast in this stuff and obviously the Kiwis and Australians are good in this too.

“I think it was probably as windy as could be for them to race us, I think they had to race our fleet’s third race because the other two had finished. Before we started the third race the wind gear on our coach boat said it was averaging 23, and then gusting 28. For us, it was about trying to do clean laps and we accomplished that for 75% of the race and then had a few swims trying to get around the last 25%. It was a race of attrition. At some point everyone was doing a bit of swimming.”

Conditions are expected to moderate on Wednesday.

Results are here

Howth's Robert Dickson goes into French Olympic Week (24-29th April 2023) in Hyerés recovering from a viral infection over the past week but it is not the only issue confronting the Howth Yacht Club ace and Tokyo 2020 crew-mate Seán Waddilove in the build-up to Paris 2024.

It's not clear just how much practice was achieved in the past fortnight but following the giant Princess Sofia Trophy regatta in Palma, Mallorca, extra practice for light air conditions was on the cards for the Irish 49er sailors, as their performance in windier conditions when they leapt into the lead was clearly linked to their overall result.

It seems like only yesterday that the Olympic debutantes packed up from Tokyo, but the sprint is on for Paris 2024, and the just-finished Princess Sofia Trophy 2023 was the first chance to see the new characters and who is returning.

For all the talk of Olympic sailing falling apart, Palma showed otherwise with a full bay and a very healthy-looking Olympic slate.

There's been no news from Dickson and Waddilove themselves, but 49er coach Matt McGovern has given forth on Palma's positives and negatives. "There were some really good positives, like having good days and leading the regatta," said McGovern. "The crux is executing the starts well and boat speed in the light stuff - if we don't start well, then we don't have the boat speed to recover and get back on plan," he added.

But what is equally frustrating for the Irish duo, (who were on target for a debut medal in Tokyo until an overweight trapeze harness got in their way) is the fact that the 49er Class has had the biggest shake-up with all of the medalists retiring post-Tokyo but were unable to capitalise on it.

As analysis from the 49er class reveals, the changing of the guard runs deeper than the medalists, with only nine of the 20 sailors from the top 10 in Tokyo still sailing and only two in-tact partnerships. That's a lot of open real estate for a fleet in the queue behind the dominant forces of Australia's Outteridge and New Zealand's Burling for a decade.

It seems likely a return now to the sort of racing that was expected in the 2000s, where winners changed on a regatta-to-regatta basis. With all their Tokyo experience, this must be an opportunity for Dickson and Waddilove.

It was certainly looking like that prior to Palma when they appeared to reap the rewards of sixth place at Mallorca Sailing Centre Regatta 2023. And there was no doubting their regatta potency either when they posted two wins on Palma's windy Wednesday, but their inability to hold on to that overall lead and not even make the top ten for the medal race is a head-scratching moment. 

Beck and Gunn

The duo will now deal with some formidable new competition, such as Palma winners Logan Dunning Beck and Oscar Gunn (NZL), who took second in the medal race to cruise and a nine-point victory. This Kinwi pair started out gold fleet brilliantly, winning the first two races and only had three races out of the top 10 all week. The team is in its eighth year on the international circuit and its fifth at the front end of the fleet. They won Kiel week 2019 and came third at the Oceania Championship in Auckland immediately prior to the 2019 Worlds, but couldn't wrestle the New Zealand entry from Burling and Tuke for Tokyo and have all the tools to be contenders in Paris.

The 49er story in Palma is a down-under tale, with four of the top five places going two each to New Zealand and Australia. With Max Paul (AUS), Tom Burton came second despite an over early in the first regatta race. Tom is the 2016 Laser gold medalist and 2019 Laser World Champion, and this second-place finish would be the best finish for a laser convert to 49er ever. Many have tried, most noticeably Robert Scheidt (BRA), but none have scored medals at top regattas until now. There were a few jokes in the boat park about 20-knot gybes being on the to-do list still, as the regatta was a light affair, but credit is due after three years of dedicated training allowing his elite sailing talent to show. 

McHardie and McKenzie (NZL) finished third after a stellar opening series had them in the lead after qualifying. They sailed a consistent final series and could have won, but a ninth in the medal race let them down a bit to close it out. 

The European fleet claimed half of the top 10, with the usual contenders having ups and downs. Wen and Liu from China came eighth, repeating their performance from ninth at the 2023 Worlds in Nova Scotia. One theme to keep an eye on could be the diversity of fleets top performances have been coming from. European, New Zealand, Australian and Chinese fleets each delivered top 10 performances after six months sailing apart. At this late stage of a quadrennial, it's been more common for the top teams to have segregated into elite groupings. Perhaps with covid forcing everyone home, teams have found a more local way to develop. 

Guilfoyle and Durcan

New rivals for the Irish Paris slot are Séafra Guilfoyle and Johnny Durcan (Royal Cork Yacht Club), who claim to have made significant gains over the winter training season. They will be looking for a gold fleet finish to Hyeres after posting 40th overall in Palma.

With just over three months remaining until the World Sailing Championships at The Hague (Netherlands), where the first nation places will be decided for Paris 2024, it will be all to play for.

Tokyo 2020 Irish 49er reps Robert Dickson (Howth Yacht Club) and Seán Waddilove (Skerries Sailing Club) earned a fourth and an eleventh on Tuesday to be 19th overall on the opening day of the Princess Sofia Trophy for Olympic classes in Mallorca.

Shifting wind directions and big changes of wind pressure again taxed competitors and race organisers alike as Mallorca’s giant 52 Trofeo Princesa Sofia Mallorca by Iberostar assumed its full size and shape when all ten Olympic classes took to the racing waters over the course of a very long day on the Bay of Palma.

Irish rivals for the single Paris 2024 berth, Séafra Guilfoyle and Johnny Durcan (Royal Cork Yacht Club) got off to a rocky start posting a 19th in the opening race but falling foul of the Black Flag in their second race in a 97 boat fleet.

Results are here

France leads 49ers

France's Kevin Fischer and Yann Jauvin made their mark in the 49er fleet with a pair of wins in the yellow fleet replicating the opening of their compatriots Erwan Fischer and Clément Pequin who went on to win the class.

Helm Kevin Fischer reported, "Conditions were pretty light when we got on the water, then wind picked up a bit with different clouds and patches of wind. It was a very tactical day. First of it all it was the start, we need to put the boat in front of the fleet to have a good vision of the wind, we planned for a good start, a good line to be able to choose the best wind.  It’s a good way to start our regatta, but it’s very long. It’s a pleasure to finish a winter training block with two wins at a World Cup sailing regatta.  Today it was more about the wind shifts. Speed was important but the big gains were from taking the right shifts. And I’m from Brittany in France, we have a lot of clouds there, and I think that background helps me read a day like today in Palma."

With the programme over the first two days compromised by the weather the organisers need a consistent Wednesday to get qualifying series back on track. 

Recent Lanzarote International Regatta winners James Peters and Fynn Sterritt will speak about Life as full-time sailors versus life and work in the 'real world'... in a 'Road To Gold' interview on Thursday, 23 February, 1900 hours UTC.

The No.1 GBR 49er team aiming for Paris 2024 will also give a Q&A session and discuss how it has been a difficult time for the 49er class transitioning to new masts and new sails, so James and Fynn will be asked for their tips on how best to spend your time when there's too much to do and what they've learned from the setbacks over the years.

The Road To Gold is a free Zoom call and a 60-minute Q&A session.

Road To Gold's Andy Rice and Hamish Willcox will be fielding live questions throughout each 60-minute session.

Join Zoom Meeting with James Peters & Fynn Sterritt

Meeting ID: 846 6777 2126
Passcode: 221537