J24 Europeans at Malmo, Sweden

Ellis takes second place at J24 Europeans

David Ellis and his crew of Jo Burchell, Ewan Watson, Rachel Thompson, and Simon Armychap, sailing Hitch Hiker, scored an excellent second place at the J24 Europeans in Malmo last week. First place went to Italian helm Andrea Formaro, with Brits Stuart Jardine and Jon Powell taking tenth and eleventh places.

David, who is clearly enjoying his sailing this season, still sees room for improvement. With the Italians winning by 21 points and counting no result worse than fourth, it’s hard not to agree that there is still work to do. In the light conditions, the Italians showed devastating pace and smart tactics. They were the outstanding crew at the event, with three of them leaving directly for Athens, where they will join the Italian Olympic Squad.

After an average first day, the Hitch Hiker team found the consistency that had already put David at the top of the UK World Qualifications table. A run of 7th, 3rd, 2nd and 5th propelled them up the scoreboard and although they picked up 18th in the final race, the fickle conditions were harder on their immediate opponents and they rose to 2nd place. This result secures David his place at next year’s Worlds in Weymouth – as if there was ever any doubt.

High spots for team GBR:

The turning point in the regatta was the Tuesday evening after racing, when the GBR team selected Rachel and Joe as their representatives in that evening’s match racing event. This proved an astute move. To tumultuous support from the quayside Rachel and Jo outsmarted the Dutch team in their first round clash, the Dutch finally sailing home to chants of “are you Scotland in disguise”. Second round opponent – the Texan Roger Harden – proved to be “all hat and no cattle”, whilst finalists Brazil were unable to off load a pre-start penalty, despite their amazing boatspeed.

Jon Powell’s “Warsash Massive”, sailing Peggy, showed steady improvement over the week, two sixth places leaving them just outside the top ten. This lifts Jon to third place in the Worlds qualifications table and although he’s now sailed four regattas, one more top ten place in a domestic event will almost certainly see him into the GBR team.

Stuart Jardine sailing Reloaded had a mixed bag of results, the best of them coming in the fickle conditions of the final race, which he read perfectly to lead at the first weather mark from Germany’s Rotoman and our own Peggy. The race finally went to the Germans, with the Italians racing up the fleet from nowhere to take second. Stuart is now in 14th place in the rankings, with only two events sailed.

Thanks to Sweden:

Those who attended the event were as one in thanking the Swedish Class Association, the MALMÖ SEGEL SÄLLSKAP and the International Jury for an excellent regatta. The welcome was warm, the sailing – in difficult conditions for the Race Officer – was fair, the International Jury was firm and pragmatic in its decisions and, in the end, the best team won.

Overall Results: