An active first day of racing at the 69th Argo Group Gold Cup saw 36 matches completed across nine flights of racing and led to a first-timer holding the Day 1 lead.
Harry Price of Australia, the 23-year-old debutante who was the 2017 Youth match racing world champion, leads the regatta with 5 points from six races. He stands tied with grizzled veteran Ian Williams of the U.K., the 42-year-old six-time match racing world champion, but beat Williams head-to-head in Flight 6 to hold the tiebreak advantage.
Bermuda’s Kelsey Durham along with his crew Stephen Dickinson, Campbell Duffy and Heath Foggo remain winless.
Holding third place is Chris Poole of the U.S. with 4.33 points, while Johnie Berntsson of Sweden and Torvar Mirsky of Australia are tied for fourth, each with 4 points.
After the top five Eric Monnin of Switzerland and Maxime Mesnil of France each have 3 points, but Monnin holds the head-to-head tiebreaker. Nicklas Dackhammar of Sweden is eighth with 2 points, Lucy Macgregor of the U.K. is ninth, Ettore Botticini of Italy is 10th, Pauline Courtois of France is 11th.
The worst collision of the day involved Poole and Botticini in their match in Flight 3. Poole, on starboard, attempted to duck the port-tack Botticini to get to the other side. But Botticini appeared to want to duck Poole and also bore away. The two crews were essentially headed straight at each other before both helmsmen pushed the tiller away from them. The boats headed up into a collision that damaged the boom and gunwale of Botticini’s boat.
A protest hearing on the water after the race saw Poole penalized one point for the incident. But he filed a subsequent protest that was heard after racing and the international jury reduced his penalty to .67 points while also penalizing Botticini .33 points. The jury penalized both crews under Rule 14, failing to avoid collision. If not for the penalty, Poole would be equal on points with Price and Williams.
2019 ARGO GROUP GOLD PRELIMINARY ROUND ROBIN STANDINGS
1. Harry Price (23, Sydney, Australia) – 5 points Crew: George Anyon, Taylor Balogh, Connor Mashlan 2. Ian Williams (42, Lymington, England, U.K.) – 5 Crew: Gerry Mitchell, Tom Powrie, Richard Sydenham 3. Chris Poole (30, Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y., USA) – 4.33 Crew: Emily Nagel, Patrick Vos, Josh Wijohn 4. Johnie Berntsson (48, Stennungsund, Sweden) – 4 Crew: Anders Dahlsjo, Erik Malmberg, Carl-Johan Uckelstan 4. Torvar Mirsky (32, Sydney, Australia) – 4 Crew: Ian Coleman, Rob Scrivenor, Cameron Seagreen 6. Eric Monnin (43, Immensee, Switzerland) – 3 Crew: Simon Brügger, Lukas Gerig, Marc Monnin, Alain Stettler 7. Maxime Mesnil (30, Le Havre, France) – 3 Crew: Yann Chateau, Hugo Feydit, Yves-Marie Pilon 8. Nicklas Dackhammar (SWE) – 2 Crew: Olof Lundgren, Eric Malmberg, Jakob Wilson 9. Lucy Macgregor (32, Poole, England, U.K.) – 2 Crew: Sally Barkow, Bethan Carden, Francesca Clapach, Kate Macgregor 10. Ettore Botticini (23, Porto Santo Stefano, Italy) – 1.67 Crew: Simone Busonero, Luca Camilli Meletani, Andrea Fornaro, Lorenzo Gennari 11. Pauline Courtois (30, Brest, France) – 1 Crew: Cédric Chateau, Nathalie Corson, Eric le Joliff 12. Kelsey Durham (25, Smiths, Bermuda) – 0 Crew: Stephen Dickinson, Campbell Duffy, Heath Foggo
