Oakcliff Triple Crown Series Battleground

Olympic hopefuls from three different countries battled it out at Stage 3 of the Oakcliff Triple Crown Series where nearly $50,000 of prize grants were awarded. With two days of breeze in the mid to low teens on October 7-8, racing was tight in the five Olympic classes – 470 Men’s, 470 Women’s, 49er, 49erFX, and the foiling Nacra 17 – in Oyster Bay, NY.

Playing the puffs was key to staying on top this weekend. “We kept our heads outside of the boat,” said Nora Brugman, who won 470W crewing for her sister Atlantic. “It was very shifty and I think we did a good job looking around the race course checking for puffs.”

Judge Ryan and Hans Henken, brother of Paris Henken who represented the US in the 49erFX in the 2016 Olympics, won the 49er class. “Our strategy was to keep it as simple as possible,” said Ryan, “Start at the favored end and try to connect the shifts, which was a little bit tricky, but we were able to stay on top.”

Ali ten Hove and Mariah Millen narrowly missed out on winning all three stages of the Triple Crown in the 49erFX class. They won Stage 1 and 2 and tied for first in Stage 3 with Sam Merson and Jack Joslin but they lost the tie breaker. When asked if they would be back next year to win it all, they answered with a resounding “Yes, definitely!”

Riley Gibbs and Louisa Chafee won the Nacra 17 class but Ravi Parent and Christina Persson put up a good fight. “We just tried to stay between the mark and the competition,” said Louisa. “We had to switch out of Nacra Worlds, big-fleet-race mode and get into match-race mode to beat them,” Riley added.

Oakcliff’s High Performance Fleet Manager, Robyn Lesh, teamed up with Nikki Barnes for the first time this weekend to compete in the 470. With a third-place finish in a tough fleet, this duo looks like a match made in heaven. “We used every race to learn something new,” said Robyn. “Yeah, we learned so much this weekend and it was incredible,” Nikki added.

Event Details – Results

Background: Teams are competing for a portion of half a million dollars of prize grants in the inaugural Oakcliff Triple Crown Series. Invited sailors in the 49er, 49erFX, Mens 470, Womens 470 and Nacra 17 are racing for $100,000 prize grant pool in each class. The three event series has stages on July 21-23, September 29-October 1, and October 6-8 held at Oakcliff Sailing in Oyster Bay, NY. Details.

Source: Oakcliff Sailing