Takapuna, Auckland, NZ
March 19, 2008

Sloppy waves and uncertain breeze made conditions challenging for everyone at the 2008 Laser Radial Women's World Championship today. All the Gold Fleet leaders had at least one bad race out of three, and I was no exception, but my 5-34-1 finishes pulled me up to tenth place overall.

The top boat is Lijia Xu of China, with 45 points and headed for her second World Championship win in three years. Evi van Acker from Belgium is second on 49 points. Sarah Steyaert of France is third. With two races remaining, there’s a good chance we can all discard a second bad performance, so we can expect more significant shifts in the scores before tomorrow night’s prizegiving.

The day began overcast, with a 10-12 knot northeaster but at least we started on time. The breeze slowly lightened throughout the race. I had a really good start in the middle of the line and immediately tacked to port and led my side of the fleet up the right side of the course. I was third at the weather mark and sailed the tricky conditions for the remainder of the race to finish fifth.

The breeze was lighter, but a big sloppy chop made the going tough as we started the second race. My start was not so stellar and in the puffy, shifty breeze I couldn’t figure out what I was doing up the first beat. At the windward mark there were only nine or ten boats behind me. From there I tried to fight back and reeled in a few boats to cross the line in 34th place.

For the last race of the day I made a really good start on the pin-end third of the line and trucked out to the left hand side of the course. The shift we expected was slow in coming so I played it smart and continued to hang out on the left and it paid off. I was first at the weather mark and stayed in front for most of the race and finished first.

I left the beach happy with my day on the water. These were tricky, changeable conditions with an eccentric wave pattern. Most people had up and down races and it was good to move up in the standings, given the challenges.

You can find full results from this regatta at '08 Worlds Results. As always I want to acknowledge my sponsors Carmeuse and K-Swiss for  their continued support of my campaign for the Olympic Gold Medal in Beijing 2008.

Sail hard,
Anna