The final day of racing at the Optimist World Championships 2001, held in Qingdao, China, has been cancelled due to lack of breeze, confirming Argentina’s Lucas Calabrese as this year’s world champion.

Calabrese improved upon his silver medal at the 2000 Worlds and his top ten finish in the 1999 event. Calabrese squeezed into a two-point lead thanks to first and second place finishes in Saturday’s racing. Local hero Zhu Ye also had a good day, carding a third and a first to take second, leaving previous leader and Asian champion Abdul Rahim, from Malaysia, in third.

China’s Xu Lijia was the highest finishing girl but the Optimist class does not discriminate sexually.

After a difficult week in light, variable breezes, the IODA AGM’s choice of venue for next year’s events was influenced primarily by consistency of breeze. Corpus Christi in Texas was selected as the Worlds venue with Tavira on Portugal selected for the 2002 Europeans.

After two years Worlds outside Europe, the Worlds was awarded to the Spa Regatta site in Holland for 2003 and in a very close vote Starigrad, Croatia edged out St. Moritz, Switzerland for the 2003 Europeans.