GBR Match Race Girls

The first part of the video below features some of the action from the finals of the Women’s Match Racing at the Rolex Miami OCR. Although it chops and changes a bit, and misses the crucial final leg of the deciding match, you can see how close and exciting the one-on-one match racing is — and the potential this event has for good media coverage at the Olympics in 2012.

This second video from OffshoreRules shows us overtaking Claire Leroy in a tussle at the windward mark in one of our semi-final matches.

Day 4 of the Rolex Miami OCR has been another great day for Annie, Ally and I. Our first two races of the day were against Barkow (USA) and Leroy (FRA) to finish off the gold fleet round robin. With two strong races we kept our clean sheet and so finished as the top seeded team going into the quarter finals, and are the only team to have not as yet conceded a defeat. Next was a short break on shore for us while the repechage round was completed and therefore our opponent for the quarters decided. After a three way tie in their results, it was the Danish team helmed by Meldgaard that finally finished 2nd in the round robin and was therefore to be our next opponent.

By 2.00pm we were out racing again against the relatively known quantity of Meldgaard’s team, as we had not sailed against them so far at this event. As they are a very experienced Match Racing team and with the wind around 8–11 knots, we knew the racing was likely to be close and it would be hard to gain any distance round the course. Two good starts gave us the jump however, and we were able to cover them around the course to win both races sailed. Although we were keen to continue racing and try and finish the job there and then, the race committee decided to call it a day and leave the remaining quarter final matches until tomorrow. Hopefully we can finish the job in just one more match tomorrow and start preparing for the best of 5 semi finals where we would be up against either Barkow or Leroy… but lets not jump ahead too soon!

In the other pairings, Tunnicliffe (USA) leads Whitty (AUS) 2–0, Souter (AUS) and Osbourne (NZL) are tied 1–1 and Leroy (FRA) leads Barkow (USA) 2–0.

Forecast is good again for tomorrow… bring it on!

You can follow the results from about mid-afternoon UK time on the event website, or check up on the latest video diary update from Annie below.

We’re just in from our final practice session before the start of the Rolex Miami Olympic Classes Regatta tomorrow. With 24 entries in the Match Racing, the fleet have been split into 3 groups of 8 for the initial round robins, the idea being that each group will sail at least 3 flights each day. In our group we have some very good competition including two American teams, both Dutch teams and a German, Swedish and Finnish team. The forecast is looking good for the week with 15+ knots expected tomorrow, and our group should be on the water racing by early afternoon (we’re 5 hours behind UK).

We’ll let you know how it goes!

Lucy

Video diary: