The day started with group A finishing up their four races to complete their round robin, and then we went out to sail.  The wind started in the high teens but slowly died throughout the day before building again at the end of the day.  The water was flat, but there were puffs and shifts which made for close, intense racing. 

We were racing the top three seeds in our group, starting with Linda Rahm from Sweeden.  We had a good race against her, with her drawing a penalty in the pre-start.  We beat her off the line, and had a close battle, but held her off and won the race.  Our next race was our closest and most exciting of the regatta.  We were racing ISAF World Ranked #2 Lucy MacGregor.  She led us off the line, but we sailed to the left of her and got around her by the top mark. We had a good battle downwind, where she took back the lead.  We stayed close on the second upwind, rounding the top mark just behind her.  We soaked low of her at the rounding and overlapped her.  She gybed and as we were gybing to avoid her, she luffed us rather sharply and although we tried to avoid her, there was contact with our kites and she got a penalty.  Our stratergy now was to just stay two boat lengths behind her so that she couldn’t burn her penalty in time for us not to pass her.  It was an exciting match and she couldn’t quite get to us.  It was an awesome race from start to finish. Our last race was against our USSTAG teammate, Genny Tulloch.  We had an even start with her, got ahead on the first beat and held her off for the finish. 

We have now advanced into the quarter-finals with seven other teams.  We will go into a  knockout series now, but who we will be racing, will be announced tomorrow morning in our briefing.  You can check the results at the regatta website.  

I would like to thank Carmeuse for their support of my campaign for the 2012 Olympics in London, England.  I would also like to thank USSTAG for their support. 

Sail hard,

Anna