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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Cynthia Goss (East Coast) 203-430-4145
Rich Roberts (West Coast) 310-835-2526 / 310-766-6547
West Coast Report
U.S
.
Olympic & Paralympic Team Trials--Sailing
Oct 6-14,
2007
470 dinghy, Men, Alamitos Bay Yacht Club/US Sailing Center, Long Beach, Calif. / McNay and Biehl: Stuart McNay and Graham Biehl posted a pair of subtle second-place finishes to seize the first-day lead over the favored Mikee Anderson-Mitterling and Dave Hughes (5-1), who had to claw their way back from a poor beginning in the opening race. McNay and Biehl pushed Keith David and crew Brad Rodi to a 15-second win in the first race and followed Anderson-Mitterling and Hughes by a much larger margin in the second. Earlier, the latter were caught on the wrong side of a 30-degree shift in the first race that started at noon in a 6-knot southerly. "We were a bit conservative," Anderson-Mitterling said. "We wanted the pin [start] and got the pin, but then there was a huge righty." By the time the second race started the wind had settled into a southwesterly sea breeze of 13 knots. They led at every mark and won by half the last leg of the Olympic-style trapezoid course. ---Rick Roberts reporting
470 dinghy, Women, ABYC/USSC / Clark and Mergenthaler: There was little to choose among Amanda Clark and Sarah Mergenthaler and their male peers Saturday. With the five women's teams competing alongside eight men's entries in the same fleet, the New York women finished fourth and third overall and first twice among their gender to take the early lead in their series. They stand third overall among the 13 boats.
RS:X sailboard, Men, ABYC / Willis: Robert Willis, 20, was barely walking when Mike Gebhardt sailed in his first of four Olympics in 1988. Now, momentarily and just barely, he stands between Gebhardt and a fifth Olympics with finishes of 1-2 to Gebhardt's 2-3 on opening day. Another of the favorites, Ben Barger, stands fourth after a retired-after-finished (RAF) in the first race before be bounced back to win the second. With light, shifty wind prevailing on the course off the Seal Beach Pier, PRO Mark Townsend held the small fleet on shore to start two hours late at 2 p.m., expecting a double-digit southwesterly sea breeze to fill in. Good call. Willis caught Gebhardt on the second beat and covered the rest of the way, and in the second race, Willis said, "I was just trying go keep Gebi behind me," as Barger recovered with a victory. Gebhardt, 41, was Willis' coach for awhile. "We're still friends," Willis said, "but it's good to be in front of him right now." –-Rick Roberts reporting
RS:X sailboard, Women, ABYC / Kremer: There's a lot at stake, but for Lisa Kremer the first day of the Trials was also "a lot of fun," she said after grabbing the early lead with a 1-2 performance. "When the wind picked up I was able to plane," she said. It's the first Olympic campaign for the 19-year-old from Worthington, Minn.
49er skiff, Southwestern Yacht Club, San Diego / Wadlow and Rast: After finishing a hard 2004 Olympic campaign in fifth place at Athens, Tim Wadlow said, "I was pretty burnt out and didn’t want to see a 49er for awhile." So his crew Pete Spaulding joined Morgan Larson's new campaign. Then 18 months ago a refreshed Wadlow cranked up another campaign with Chris Rast as crew. Saturday they opened the Trials with 1-2-1 finishes to take the early lead over Dalton Bergan and Zack Maxam (2-4-3). Larson and Spaulding were in fifth after starting early in the first race before blazing back with a 1-2. They'll discard their opening mis-step later. Winds were 11-15 knots with a large San Diego swell and chop on Coronado Roads. "We're one of the lightest 49ers internationally at 145 kilos (319 pounds)," Wadlow said. "A lot of the guys lost weight because they thought it would be light wind here. We saw in the practice days that when the wind was up we were a bit stronger." ---Margo Hemond reporting
Finn dinghy, Newport Harbor Yacht Club, Balboa / Zach Railey: It's the largest fleet in the Trials with 42 boats and veteran campaigners as old as 72, but Zach Railey, 23, led the way with a 1-2 in the first two races. With winds of 8 knots building to 14 through the afternoon, Railey held off Geoff Ewenson (2-3), 37, by three points. Andrew Pimental, 49, won the second race to hold a third-place tie.
Star keelboat, California Yacht Club, Marina del Rey / Mendelblatt and Liljedahl: From shifty and light to fresh double digits, Santa Monica Bay threw the whole mix at some of America's best sailors, who couldn't get enough. Not knowing when they might see such conditions again, the race committee ran an extra third race, which Mark Mendelblatt and crew Magnus Liljedahl (3-3-1) won to jump into a solid seven-point lead. With only the scheduled two races, George Szabo and crew Andrew Scott would have been on top with 2-1 finishes, but they slipped to 11th in the third. "It was a good start for us," Mendelblatt said, "but only a start. We got our share of breaks. It's easy to fall into pressure holes here. We tried to stay in the middle, but you can get hurt anyplace." Szabo and Scott are second and Mark Reynolds and Hal Haenel---there's a pair of familiar names---are third. ---Tom O'Conor reporting
Tornado catamaran, San Diego Yacht Club / Daniel/Stunzi and Lovell/Ogletree: If anyone was going to play spoilers for John Lovell and Charlie Ogletree's to reach their fourth Olympics, it figured to be Robbie Daniel and crew Hunter Stunzi. They swapped firsts and seconds to set the stage for a week-long scenario of high-performance sailing. "We're happy with the day," said Daniel, who spoke of leads changing on subtle shifts in winds building to 18 knots on Coronado Roads by day's end, of covering Lovell/Ogletree with a dozen matching jibes to the finish of the first race, and of Lovell/Ogletree "attacking before the start" of the second race. "They’re a lot faster when the wind comes up," Daniel said. "We didn't change gears for it." ---Mike Foster and Jared Wohlgemuth reporting
The leaders:
470 Men (8 boats; 2 of 16 races): 1. Stuart McNay (Lincoln, Mass.)/Graham Biehl (San Diego), 2-2, 4 points; 2. Mikee Anderson-Mitterling (Coronado, Calif.)/David Hughes (San Diego), 5-1, 6; 3. Charles Modica (Hobe Sound, Fla.)/Han Jensen (Duxbury, Mass.), 3-5, 8.
470 Women (5 boats; 2 of 16 races): 1. Amanda Clark (Shelter Island, N.Y.)/Sarah Mergenthaler (New York, N.Y.), 1-1, 2 points ; 2. tie between Molly Carapiet (Belvedere, Calif.)/Molly O'Bryan (San Diego), 2-3, and Erin Maxwell (Norwalk, Conn.)/Isabelle Kinsolving (New York, N.Y.), 3-2, 5.
RS:X Men (6 boats): 1. Robert Willis (Chicago, Ill.), 1-2, 3 points; 2. Ben Barger (Tampa, Fla.); 2. Mike Gebhardt (Ft. Pierce, Fla.), 2-3, 5 ; 3. Jim Sobeck (East
Quoge, N.Y.), 3-4, 7.
RS:X Women (7 boats): 1. Lisa Kremer (Worthington, Minn.), 1-2, 3 points; 2. Farrah Hall (Annapolis, Md.), 4-1, 5; 3. Nancy Rios (Miami, Fla.), 2-4, 6.
49er (13 boats; 3 of 24 races): 1. Tim Wadlow (Beverly, Mass.)/Chris Rast (San Diego), 1-2-1, 4 points; 2. Dalton Bergan (Seattle, Wash.)/Zack Maxam (Costa Mesa, Calif.), 2-4-3, 9; 3. John Heineken (Larkspur, Calif.)/Matt Noble (Pt. Richmond, Calif.), 4-5-4, 13.
Finn (42 boats): 1. Zach Railey (Clearwater, Fla.), 1-2, 3 points; 2. Geoffrey Ewenson (Annapolis), 2-3, 5; 3. tie among Andrew Pimental (Portsmouth, R.I.), 7-1, Bryan Boyd (Annapolis), 3-5, and Darrell Peck (Gresham, Ore.), 4-4, 8.
Star (19 boats): 1. Mark Mendelblatt (St. Petersburg, Fla.)/Magnus Liljedahl (Miami, Fla.), 3-3-1, 7 points; 2. George Szabo (San Diego)/Andrew Scott (Annapolis), 2-1-11, 14; 3. Mark Reynolds (San Diego)/Hal Haenel (Los Angeles), 12-2-2, 16.
Tornado (6 boats): 1. Tie between Robbie Daniel (Clearwater, Fla.)/Hunter Stunzi (Charleston, S.C.), 1-2, and John Lovell (New Orleans, La.)/Charlie Ogletree (Kemah, Tex.), 2-1, 3 points; 3. Colin Merrick (Portsmouth, R.I.)/John Sampson (Portsmouth, R.I.), 4-3, 7.
Complete results
To follow the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Team Trials – Sailing, visit the event website at www.ussailing.org/olympics/OlympicTrials. Daily reports from the East and West coasts, results and photos will be posted during the event. Video from the event with commentary by Gary Jobson will be available daily on the website of the NBC network at www.NBCOlympics.com.
The Beijing 2008 Olympic Games will take place August 8–24; the Paralympic Games take place September 6–17, 2008. Both the Olympic and Paralympic regattas will be held in Qingdao, China, a coastal city located 430 miles east of Beijing.
About US SAILING
The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Team Trials – Sailing are managed by US SAILING, national governing body for the sport. Founded in 1897 and headquartered in Portsmouth, Rhode Island, the organization provides leadership for the sport of sailing in the United States. US SAILING offers training and education programs for instructors and race officials, supports a wide range of sailing organizations and communities, issues offshore rating certificates, and provides administration and oversight of competitive sailing across the country, including National Championships and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Sailing Teams. For more information, please visit our website.
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