The first day’s racing at the Laser Radial Open and Women’s World Championship took place today in Australia hosted by the Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron in Brisbane.

Krystal Weir from Australia started her championship campaign in the best way possible winning both the opening races on Day 1. In the first race she did not have it all her own way when Cecilia Carranza Saroli from Argentina led round the first mark in a 15kt wind. Saroli held Weir until the run when Weir pulled through to take the lead which she held to the finish.

In the second race the wind increased by 3kts and the current was now against the wind creating difficult conditions for both the male and female fleets. Weir led at the first mark and went on to extend her lead to over three minutes at the finish ahead of Miranda Powrie from New Zealand.

In the men’s division, racing as two fleets, honours were more even. In the first fleet race Michael Blackburn led fellow Australian Tom Slingsby by a couple of seconds at the first mark. Blackburn overtook Slingsby on the downwind and led to the finish. In the second fleet Matt Blakey from New Zealand put in a long port tack from the start to lead fellow Kiwi, Martin Winterat the first mark. Blakey extended downwind and carried his advantage until the finish.

In his second race Blakey went right. Ricky Ironmonger from Australia went left and just held an advantage over Blakey at the first mark. These two then engaged in their own private race on the downwind and next upwind until Ironmonger got a couple of small shifts to break clear. Blakey described the second race as “more difficult because of the increased chop. It was very difficult to stop running into waves downwind.”

Blackburn was not able to repeat his first beat success in his second race rounding behind Slingsby after a few missed shifts near mark one. Blackburn said: “It was a good race and Tom did well to hold hold on to his lead.”

Two more races are scheduled for today.

Overall Results (provisional)

Male

1 AUS 178640 BLACKBURN Michael 3.0

1 NZL 175277 BLAKEY Matthew 3.0

4 CRO 167831 LOLIC Aron 6.0

5 NZL 175279 WINTER Martin 8.0

6 NZL 177074 BARTROM Jake 8.0

7 NZL 136721 ORAMS Mark 10.0

8 NZL 161262 GEALE Jason 10.0

9 AUS 161244 MORGAN Simon 12.0

9 AUS 177729 SKULANDER Nick 12.0

Female

1 AUS 180195 WEIR Krystal 2.0

2 ARG 179356 CARRANZA SAROLI Cecilia 7.0

3 SUI 179395 MEYER Corinne 7.0

4 NZL 159153 POWRIE Miranda 8.0

5 ISR 168365 EDELMAN Nufar 11.0

6 AUS 153136 BRIDGE Christine 12.0

7 IRL 173815 HANNA Debbie 13.0

8 NZL 176918 WINTHER Sara 18.0

9 NED 166368 JUTJENS Gea 20.0

10 AUS 178787 PATTERSON Lyndall 21.0