England starts strong at Student Yachting World Cup

La Rochelle. France (October 17, 2014) – A wonderful blue sky and a nice wind at 12 knots welcomed the competitors for that first day of racing at the Student Yachting World Cup. The weather was wonderful all day long… what an Indian summer here in La Rochelle: 23°C this afternoon! The wind kept on weakening throughout the day to reach 8 knots so only three races (two windward/leeward courses and a coastal course) were run today.

The English team won the first windward/leeward course (1,2 nautical miles). Even though they were called back at the beginning of the race, they managed to catch up. The Italian crew made a really good start and were ahead at half of the race. They finished second. This race was really close with only four minutes between the first and the last boat on that one-hour race.

The second windward/leeward course was shorter than the first one (1,1 nautical miles) due to the abated wind. Two boats missed the start and were called back, the USA and Japan. Despite that, the American team did a good race: from 5th at the end of the first lap they finally reached the third place. The Japanese team didn’t do that well and was disqualified for OCS… Norway won the race.

The last race of the day was a coastal course (n°5) of 15 miles, which went from the isle of Aix to Roche du Sud (near the isle of Ré). It started at 13h48 and finished round 4’o clock. The Scottish crew led for two thirds of the race, when the English team overtook them. They were followed by Norway and Scotland. Globally this was a quite easy race with little tactics involved.

For that first day of sailing, the English crew has been quite impressive today: they top the ranking with four points. England makes a really good start and might become the next world champion if all goes like today… The struggle for the second and third places is on-going between Norway (11pts), Scotland (12pts) and the United States (14pts), but Italy (16pts) and Switzerland (17pts) are just following. After just one day of race, everything remains possible!

Twelve teams from eleven countries are represented: Canada (Dalhousie University), England (Southampton University), France (Polytechnique and the ESCE), Italy (CUS Brescia), Ireland (University College Dublin), Japan (Meijigakuin University), Norway (BI Norwegian Business School), Scotland (Strathclyde University), Switzerland (EPFL), the United States (California Maritime Academy) and Wales (Cardiff University).

Event website: http://www.sywoc.org

Report by event media.