January 23, 2006
3 minutes reading time
Norway Has It's Day
Norway's Jostein STORDAHL, and his Sonar crew of Aleksander WANG-HANSEN and Per Eugen KRISTIANSEN put two wins on the scoreboard today, to keep their medal prospects strong at the 2006 Alcoa IFDS World Disabled Sailing Championships in Perth, Australia. Their compatriot Bjornar ERIKSTAD (NOR) also had a good day in the 2.4 Metre, scoring third and second places, to move him into the Championship lead after the discard came into play.
Norway’s Jostein STORDAHL, and his Sonar crew of Aleksander WANG-HANSEN and Per Eugen KRISTIANSEN put two wins on the scoreboard today, to keep their medal prospects strong at the 2006 Alcoa IFDS World Disabled Sailing Championships in Perth, Australia. Their compatriot Bjornar ERIKSTAD (NOR) also had a good day in the 2.4 Metre, scoring third and second places, to move him into the Championship lead after the discard came into play.
STODAHL summed up his day, ‘My racing was splendid since we won both races. In the first race it was very tricky, first the left side was best, then the right side was best, and then the middle way was best. In the second race we were leading from the beginning to the end.’
With the British crew of John ROBERTSON, Hannah STODEL and Stephen THOMAS having a poor day, with tenth and sixth places, the Sonar fleet is still very open, with ROBERTSON and co. clinging to a half point lead over Germany’s Jens KROKER, Holger SCHOENBERG and Tobias SCHUELTZ.
Britain’s Helena LUCAS‘ tenancy on the top of the leaderboard looked to have continued in the 2.4 Metre fleet with a consistent day, in difficult conditions, to put fourth and second places in her scoreline. However a DSQ in race six sees her fall back to third place overall.
She said the conditions were so difficult it made her head hurt, ‘It was tricky, specially the second one, it was really shifty, my head hurts now. It was really hard sailing, the first race wasn’t too bad, that was a bit more settled, but second race the shifts were just massive.’
With Perth’s legendary seabreeze constantly fighting to overcome the incumbent easterly, it was a day for brains rather than brawn.
This suited US SAILING Rolex Yachtsman of the Year, Nick SCANDONE (USA) from California, in his first race of the day in the 2.4 Metre, where he led from start to finish, but it worked against him in the second race, when he bombed to 15th place.
ERIKSTAD has climbed into first place on the leaderboard after his good results today and the race six DSQ of LUCAS, ‘I’m very satisfied,’ he said. ‘It was a little tricky today, it was quite shifty, and the wind was up and down, so you needed to trim a lot, and change the boat trim to get the speed.’
This Championship, being hosted by the Royal Perth Yacht Club on the Swan River, is the first qualifying event for the 2008 Paralympic Sailing Competition, with the top seven nations qualifying, subject to IPC approval. The eleven race series finishes on Wednesday 25 January.
Top Tens
2.4 Metre
| Pos | Nation | Skipper | R1 | R2 | R3 | R4 | R5 | R6 | R7 | Pts |
| 1 | NOR | Bjornar ERIKSTAD | 2 | 3 | (19) DNF | 2 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 14 |
| 2 | GER | Heiko KRÖGER | 4 | 2 | 1 | (7) | 5 | 6 | 1 | 19 |
| 3 | GBR | Helena LUCAS | 1 | 1 | 2 | 11 | 1 | (20) DSQ | 4 | 20 |
| 4 | CAN | Bruce MILLAR | 6 | (17) DNF | 5 | 5 | 4 | 2 | 13 | 35 |
| 5 | CAN | Paul TINGLEY | 3 | 6 | 6 | 9 | 9 | (9) | 5 | 38 |
| 6 | GBR | Megan PASCOE | (13) | 8 | 4 | 1 | 10 | 8 | 9 | 40 |
| 7 | CAN | Danny MCCOY | 8 | (14) | 10 | 6 | 3 | 4 | 10 | 41 |
| 8 | NZL | Andrew MAY | (12) | 5 | 11 | 3 | 8 | 11 | 6 | 44 |
| 9 | USA | Nick SCANDONE | 9 | 9 | 8 | (18) DNF | 6 | 1 | 15 | 48 |
| 10 | USA | Roger CLEWORTH | 5 | 7 | 3 | 8 | 13 | 12 | (14) | 48 |
Sonar
| Pos | Nation | Skipper | Crew | Crew | R1 | R2 | R3 | R4 | R5 | R6 | R7 | Pts |
| 1 | GBR | John ROBERTSON | Hannah STODEL | Stephen THOMAS | 1 | 2 | 5 | 2 | 1 | (9) | 6 | 17 |
| 2 | GER | Jens KROKER | Holger SCHOENBERG | Tobias SCHUETZ | 6 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 4 | (9) | 17 |
| 3 | AUS | Jamie DUNROSS | Colin HARRISON | Graeme MARTIN | 3 | 5 | 1 | (9) | 7 | 3 | 2 | 21 |
| 4 | NOR | Jostein STORDAHL | Aleksander WANG-HANSEN | Per EUGEN KRISTIANSEN | 5 | 4 | (9) | 3 | 8 | 1 | 1 | 22 |
| 5 | ISR | Dror COHEN | Arnon EFRATI | Beni Vexler | 8 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 7 | (8) | 30 |
| 6 | IRL | Paul MCCARTHY | Paul RYAN | Chris THOMAS | 4 | 9 | 8 | (10) | 4 | 5 | 3 | 33 |
| 7 | ISR | Shimon BEN YAKOV | Moshe ZEHAVI | Yossi Barda | 10 | 6 | 7 | 5 | 2 | 10 | (17) DSQ | 40 |
| 8 | AUS | Peter THOMSON | Keith CONDER | Barry Astwood | 2 | (12) | 10 | 7 | 11 | 8 | 7 | 45 |
| 9 | IS | Avi TZUR | Baruch PERETZMAN | Shlomo DAHAN | 9 | 10 | 12 | 12 | (13) | 2 | 4 | 49 |
| 10 | CAN | Ken KELLY | Brian MACKIE | Don TERLSON | 7 | 11 | 14 | 8 | 6 | (17) DSQ | 5 | 51 |
For all the news from the Alcoa IFDS World Disabled Sailing Championships CLICK HERE.