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Bronze Medal at Sail Auckland PDF  | Print |  E-mail

Auckland, NZ
February 19, 2008

I held onto my third place today and won the Bronze Medal at the Singapore Airlines Sail Auckland 2008 regatta after finishing first in the last fleet race and second in the Medal Race. As expected, Sari Multala from Finland won the Gold and Lijia Xu from China took the Silver.

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Low tide trek to the Medal Race

The Waitemata had its share of surprises today. The forecast called for wind from the east but after a short wait for a breeze to fill in we started in a light north-northwester. I got a good start but two thirds of the way up the weather I was yellow-flagged for body pumping. After I made my two penalty turns I rounded the weather mark in 11th place.

When I started the run I broke from the pack and headed for the other side of the course, picking up about six boats and reaching the leeward mark in fifth place. On the weather leg I headed out to the right while most everyone else went left. Then the breeze clocked around to the east and began to steady. The race was mine and my win gave me a nice little margin going into the Medal Race that I didn’t have last night.

When we went back out for the Medal Race several hours later, we were met with relatively flat seas and a 14-knot easterly. The race was a short one, only about 15 minutes and it was so much fun. I was scrapping the whole time with Sarah Blanck from Australia who had finished second to me in the last fleet race. This time, I was second at the top mark, second at the leeward mark, and first at the next mark, but Sarah got inside me on the broad reach and led me into the finish.

I’m happy with my results for this regatta. I’ve been in the top ten at recent regattas but it was nice to Medal again at an international event.

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Day’s end – a helping hand from Brad

You can find full results from this regatta at Singapore Airlines Sail Auckland 2008. Click on results on the top menu, then choose Laser Radials. I would like to thank my sponsors Carmeuse and K-Swiss for  their continued support of my campaign for the Olympic Gold Medal in Beijing 2008.

Sail hard,
Anna

 

 

 
 

Team Member