Sailors get back in the groove

The holiday is over for Tauranga sailor Peter Burling as he and Blair Tuke get back to work with Emirates Team New Zealand.

Fresh from back-to-back 49er World Championship titles in Spain, the pair are in Nice in Southern France for another hectic few days at the Extreme Sailing Series.

Emirates Team New Zealand practising in Nice, France.

And the pressure is on to maintain the momentum gained by Dean Barker and crew at the Istanbul round of the series in September.

Barker won that regatta, lifting the team back to third place on the series' 2014 leader board.

Burling and Tuke, whose last regatta in the Extreme 40 was at St Petersburg in June, were feeling 'a little rusty” and out of touch with the unique Extreme 40 style of racing.

Overnight they were head-first into practice day, making the most of every minute on the water. First the Emirates Team New Zealand chase boat ran some races against Alinghi.

Other boats joined in until the race committee started official practice in the afternoon.

The committee ran six races until the breeze, never more than 6-7 knots, faded completely.

After a slow start, Emirates Team New Zealand crew began to get into the groove and performance improved throughout the session.

The fleet will have to cope with light breeze forecast for the rest of the week.

Burling says: 'There will be a light offshore breeze in the morning, followed by three or four hours of calm before a light onshore breeze fills in.

'We are not expecting more than five knots at any time and will have to adapt techniques to suit.

'In conditions like that it's very easy to go from the front to the back of the fleet. It will be a case of trying to get off the start line cleanly and take any opportunity for a gain that occurs.”

Racing at Nice starts on Thursday (French time), finishing up on Sunday.

You may also like....

0 comments

Leave a Comment


You must be logged in to make a comment.