After days of postponements waiting for the wind to fill in, a tantalizing 12 knot breeze called out to the sailors in the morning of day six of the Youth Olympic Games regatta in Singapore.
Racing on the Byte CII boys' course saw some surprises today as many of the current fleet leaders finished out of top five places in the three races sailed. Shifty winds, strong current decreasing over the day and gusts across the course made for tricky conditions. The strategy for each race varied. In race nine, the left side paid enormous dividends for sailors who made an investment there on the upwind leg.
The 1st race of the day started in approx 8 knots, but the breeze eased quite a bit during the race, breeze was very patchy across the course by the end of the race. Owen Siese started well in clear air in the middle of the line, after a minute or so on starboard Siese opted to tack on to port to stay with the fleet which had mostly gone off to the right.
A few boats hit the left hand corner hard Pavlo Babych and Zili Wang and they rounded the first mark with a big lead. Florian Haufe led the boats out of the right, while Siese hovered around 10th to 12th position. Not much change in positions on downwind leg, and 2nd weather leg did not offer much in the way of passing lanes as all sailed to protect the left. A good 2nd downwind saw Siese claim a couple of spots to finish in 9th place.
For 2nd race the breeze began to build to 10 knots. Siese again had a solid start off the middle left of line with a good lane. Most boats opted to play the left, and it was the three 'island boys’ Ian Barrows, Just Van Aanholt and Siese that led around the first weather mark. Siese creped ahead of Van Aanholt on the downwind leg, rounding in second behind Barrows, the breeze began to shift a fair bit back and forth, Juan Ignacio Biava played these shifts very well to move up to 2nd, while Van Aanholt, Siese and Wang battled hard for 3rd place.
Barrows had a small lead over Boava at the 2nd weather mark, with a small gap to Van Aanholt a little ahead of Siese and Wang.
Biava finished first beating Barrows to the line, Van Aanholt held off a closing Siese who finished fourth.
The 3rd race, saw Siese get another good start, however with 200 yards to weather mark, Siese snagged some weed or debris on daggerboard - by the time it was cleared Barrows was rolling over his air and to make matters worse they were already on port layline with procession of boats rolling over his air! What looked like a top 5 rounding turned in to a 12th-15th!
Meanwhile Barrows went around with a huge lead, and Kaarle Tapper with a big gap over 3rd. Good reach and downwind and Siese was back to touching distance of large pack. The pack opted for the right gate to sail off to the left again- Siese took the left gate and makes good ground just by rounding in clear air. Now back into top 10 maybe as high as 8th, Siese again catches weed/debris on the daggerboard, it gets cleared but immediately snags rudder, finally cleared, Siese decided to tack but tiller was somehow snagged in bungey cord while clearing the weed, Siese comes out of the tack and capsizes! He gets back up quickly but now back to 12th. Manages to pick up one on the downwind, but finishes in 11th.
Barrows goes into the non-discard medal race with a comfortable lead but silver and bronze medal positions remain close between Haufe, Tapper, Van Aanholt, Siese and Choy with an outside chance.
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