The 2004 Mistral world championship in Turkey has been plagued with tricky wind conditions all week and the final day on Friday was no exception. Racing was cancelled on the final day due to light winds and the results stood from the day before, with Team GBR sailor Nick Dempsey finishing fifth and team mate Natasha Sturges ninth.

After 11 races Julien Bontemps of France stamped his authority on the class, winning the event by six points from Przemek Miarczynski of Poland. Fellow Frenchman Nicolas Huguet finished third overall.

Team GBR sailor Nick Dempsey sailed a consistent week, regularly making appearances at the top of the fleet to finish in fifth place overall and tied on equal points with fourth placed Alexandre Guyader of France.

In the women’s fleet, the 2000 Olympic gold medallist Alessandra Sensini of Italy put in an incredible performance, scoring just one result outside the top three, out of ten races, to win the world championship by 36 points from double Olympic medallist Barbara Kendall of New Zealand. Faustine Merret also ensured that France would be on the podium in the women’s fleet as well as the men’s, finishing in third place overall.

Team GBR sailor Natasha Sturges finished in ninth place overall with team mate Bryony Shaw fifteenth.

RYA Team GBR Mistral coach Barrie Edgington commented: “The standard within the Mistral fleets is extremely high and it is very hard to predict who will do well this summer at the Games. There are specialists in every different conditions and it is probably one of the toughest classes to call. From this event there are certain things that we have learnt and we will be taking these factors into consideration between now and the Games, in order to put in the best performance in Athens.”

Overall results

Women

1, Alessandra Sensini, ITA (1,1,(8),1,3,3,1,2,1,1) 14 pts

2, Barbara Kendall, NZL (4,8,2,7,(15),5,2,4,8,10) 50 pts

3, Faustine Merret, FRA (10,(20),1,16,2,2,6,12,6,9) 64 pts

GBR

9, Natasha Sturges (2,10,16,22,16,6,(27),14,7,13) 106 pts

15, Bryony Shaw ((30),29,17,13,12,22,5,17,17,14) 146 pts

Men – gold fleet

1, Julien Bontemps, FRA (4,1,6,(14),1,2,2,3,1,1,(7)) 21 pts

2, Przemek Miarczynski, POL (3,2,(18),12,4,1,1,1,(3),2,1) 27

3, Nicolas Huguet, FRA (1,1,2,1,3,(BFD),3,6,9,(19),10) 36 pts

GBR

5, Nick Dempsey (7,4,5,4,2,(8),8,(14),13,5,3) 53 pts (inc. 2 penalty points for not signing off)