Issue date
Josh Junior will go into the final day of the 2016 Finn European Championships well placed for a podium finish, lying 2nd overall.
The regatta, featuring 90 boats and being raced in Barcelona Spain, wraps up tomorrow.
After no racing was possible on day four, and the promise of sufficient wind for today was uncertain, organisers managed to get two races in and the fleet has now sailed six in total. Following race five the discard came into play and that affected the leader-board too.
Pieter Jan Postma from the Netherlands was one of the most consistent today and he has taken the overall lead from Josh Junior.
In today’s races Junior was 8th in the opener and then recorded a mid-pack result (42nd). Doing battle with 90 other Finns on the start-line, Junior was left trying to get back to the front of the pack when those that had started on the pin end got the shift and left everyone else behind.
Here’s how the points at the top stack up – Postma (NED) is on 18 and Junior (NZL) is ten adrift on 28. Behind the kiwi there’s an eight points gap to Milan Vujasinovic (CRO) on 36, with Zsombor Berecz (HUN) in 4th overall on 38 points.
Andrew Murdoch, also from the NZL Sailing Team, is lying 20th overall. In racing today he placed 33rd and 17th.
John Cutler, Olympic bronze medallist in the Finn at Soeul 1988, is coach to the NZL Sailing Team Finn squad.
In five months, on 9 August 2016, racing at the Rio 2016 Olympic Sailing Regatta gets underway on Guanabara Bay, Rio de Janeiro. The battle for the only Finn spot for New Zealand is likely to be one of the toughest decisions selectors will face.
2016 Finn European Championships
New Zealand’s current standings
2nd Josh Junior (8, 6, 1, 5, 8, 42)
20th Andrew Murdoch (19, 26, 4, 40, 33, 17)
80th Brendan McCarty (77, 70, 76, 75, 74, 66)
About the event
The 2016 Senior and Junior European Championship is being held at the Barcelona International Sailing Centre in Spain from 4 to 12 March. An opening series of ten races will be followed by the medal race for the top ten on Saturday 12 March.
The event website is: 2016.finneuropeans.org
Media
There will be regular updates including an on-the-water feed via Twitter, Instagram and Facebook
Twitter: twitter.com/Finn_Class (Use #finneuros)
Facebook: www.facebook.com/Finn-Class-110408332633/
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/thefinnchannel
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/finnclass
For more information:
Jodie Bakewell-White
Communications Manager
Yachting New Zealand
+64 21 709 065
jodie@yachtingnz.org.nz
