Chicago Final Day + Photos

The finals series didn’t start the way we intended them to. We were put on the back foot losing the first two matches in a first to 3 semi final against Norbjerg(DEN). We made little errors in these two races that put us behind enough to not be able catch back up. It was now do or die. We had to win 3 in a row to have a chance of racing for the championship. The third race went a little better, putting a penalty on him in the pre start and managing to get another on him at the top mark. Gaining a good lead we controlled from here. The 4th and 5th races were a lot smoother. We seemed to have found our form, nailing our time on distance to the start line and pre start manoeuvres to be able to take the two victories and move through to the final. A well fought battle by the team in high pressure situations and a well deserved spot in the Finals.

Keith Swinton our trans-tasman rival was to be our opponent. He had been sailing well all regatta and had demolished his semi final opponent Gremaldi (ARG) 3-0. We knew we were equally as good and could take this one out, so a quick motivational speech from Sam and we were into it. The wind had dropped right off now and the chop was just as big as previous days. The race committee had shortened the final to the first to win 2 due to the dying wind so we came out firing.

Race 1 we entered from starboard and lead back at to the pin end. With our time on distance spot on we won the favoured pin end forcing him to tack off to the boat. By the top mark we had tacked on him several times and had a 5 length lead. We defended this lead upwind by not giving him an inch and carried on to win the 1st race.

By the second race the wind had dropped even more down to around 4kts. With the course skewed towards the right we wanted him to be to the left of us. We started to windward and tacked off to the right hand side of the course. With tacking angles around 110 degrees we didn’t look to hot but tacking back at him for the first cross no one looked hot. We were practically pointing at each other on opposite tacks. We lee bowed him, forcing him left to the short side. A few more tacks and lee bows and we were on the port hand lay line with him tight to windward of us. We saw this as not a very strong position in the light winds approaching the top mark so we luffed him and sat head to wind until both boats had stopped . In a now strong position we bore away when he was stuck head to wind. Our timing to do this was impeccable as we gained about a 10 boat length advantage rounding the top mark. We lost a little on the downwind in some of the toughest conditions we had sailed in but maintained our lead upwind. Rounding the mark for the second time we had a comfortable lead and covered him on the downwind. He caught up a lot but we managed to hold our lead and win by two boat lengths. Score 2-0 and the first Chicago Match Race regatta going to Waka Racing.

A brilliant result that we are thrilled with. Coming from some very disappointing regattas in the middle of the year we have stepped up our professionalism on and off the water. We have all worked hard on our fitness in the last 6 weeks and have really come together as a team a lot more. The team is growing immensely and we are really starting to work well together. We are now off to New York to compete in the Knickerbocker Cup which starts in two days time and hope to back up our last performance with one equally as good. We would like to thank Stefan of Widex, Pacific Sports Community Trust, Ian of Tax Management NZ, Line 7, RNZYS, Simon from Frontend Design and the WAKA racing supporters club for all their help and generosity.