New Zealand's Sam Meech has slipped from first to third in the Laser class following a tough day of racing at sailing World Championships in Denmark.
New Zealand sailor Sam Meech. Photo: World Sailing
Meech had what he described as his worst race of the year to finish 34th in the opening race of the Laser gold fleet but recovered well in the second (7th) and is now third overall.
Meech went into the first day of gold fleet racing with the leader's yellow bib but soon found himself in trouble.
He started the first completed race reasonably well - an earlier attempt was abandoned due to a lack of wind - but was badly affected when he slammed into a wave when tacking on the first upwind and couldn't extricate himself as the breeze died. There were periods when it was almost like dodgems as many of the 65 boats converged on the marks and Meech might have wished he was at Rainbows End instead.
"Today was an absolute nightmare," he said. "I think I sailed probably the worst race of my year so far, unfortunately, in that first race. It was just bad timing to have it, especially after all the work I have put in this year. It was raceable, but only just.
"Once we are in gold fleet like this, if you get a bad race you move back in the standings a lot. I think there's still a lot of racing left to go but it definitely shows how tight the racing is in the Laser fleet.
"I will pray for some more wind tomorrow. I don't know whether they were putting us through those races just for the TV coverage but some better racing tomorrow would be good."
Meech is now six points behind Australia's Matthew Wearn, who is the only Laser sailor to register scores all in the top 10, and two points behind reigning world champion Pavlos Konties of Cyprus. New Zealand's Tom Saunders is 13th.
Josh Junior had a 12th and seventh to climb to third overall in the Finn, with Andy Maloney winning the second race to climb to sixth overall.
Junior had one of the best days of anyone and is now eight points off the lead, with Maloney a further nine points back.
"Everyone has a big score so tomorrow it will be all on," Maloney said.
Junior added: "Today was incredibly tough, but I'm very happy. It was a challenging day and people are collecting a lot of points. To get two good ones is good but there's another day of racing [before the top 10 medal race] and it's all very close.
"It's a really good-quality fleet and it's easy to have a bad race. For us, the secret is to treat every day and every race the same. Doing all those things, hopefully we get good results consistently. That's the aim."
The Finns have two races tomorrow before the top 10 medal race the following day.
Logan Dunning-Beck and Oscar Gunn remain second in the 49er with seven races remaining.
Paul Snow-Hansen and Dan Willcox climbed to 11th in the men's 470 and the pair have two more races to qualify for the top 10 medal race. Liv Mackay and Micah Wilkinson are 13th in the Nacra 17 and Sam Bullock 16th in the men's foiling kite.
