Star Sailors League- Quality field chase $200k prize money in Nassau
by Bob Fisher on 4 Dec 2014
Luke Patience, 470 pictured at the ISAF Sailing World Cup, Palma, Mallorca, March 31st to April 5th, 2014. Ocean Images/British Sailing Team
Nassau Tuesday Evening: Forty of the World’s best sailors with compete in the next four days for a $200,000 prize fund and their credential read like a Who’s Who of sailing.
It has been drawn primarily from mature sailors in the Star Sailors League, but it has been extended to include the top sailors from other Olympic classes.
One of the first skippers to be announced at last evening’s ceremony was Giles Scott (GBR), twice world champion of the Finn class. Scott will be sailing with countryman Steve Milne. Their fellow countryman, 2012 Olympic silver medallist in the 470 class, Luke Patience, well out of place in physique, was paired with an American relative, James Buchan of Seattle.
At the other end of the pairings, there was the 2012 Star Gold medallist, Freddie Loof of Sweden together with Anders Ekstrom, who had missed the previous year’s regatta and is tipped for a medal in this one. So too is the current class world champion Diego Negri of Italy with his regular crew Sergio Lambertenghi, as is Augie Diaz (USA), the recent winner of the International Masters Championship in San Diego.
One must also look to the defending champion, five-time Olympic medallist Robert Scheidt of Brazil, who is back with Bruno Prada, and their countryman, also five-time Olympic medallist, Torben Grael with Guilherme de Almeida. They all face a nine-race regatta over the first three days and then the fleet is reduced to ten crews for the quarter-finals, seven for the semi-final and four for the finals on the last day. The $200,000 prize fund, of which the winner will take home the bulk will most likely be donated it to charity.
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