Nacra 17s @Enoshima 2019: Tita & Banti 1st
Photos: Ready Steady Tokyo Sailing 2019. Olympic Sailing Test Event ©JESUS RENEDO/SAILING ENERGY/WORLD SAILING 21 August, 2019. – Ruggero Tita & Caterina Banti getting in the zone again for a key win towards Tokyo. For Lange & Carranza there was no miracle this time around. The Argies were in second place before the Medal Race and were having an excellent regatta , but this time the final race expertise both have demonstrated not only at Rio but in many regattas since then was not enough, finsihing in 5th place behind Waterhouse & Darmanin.
The quality of the teams for Tokyo is nowhere near Rio though, and its going to be a tough fight for the Gold in 2020. Which it will make the Games more interesting and the win even more rewarding for those grabbing podium next year in this same venue.
Top ten , below official report sent by Nacra 17 Class Assoc. Complete results available here
| Pos | Helm | Crew | Flag | R1 | R2 | R3 | R4 | R5 | R6 | R7 | R8 | R9 | R10 | R11 | R12 | MR | Net | ||
| 1 | TITA | Ruggero | BANTI | Caterina | ITA 26 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 7 | 7 | 9 | 2 | 6 | 5 | -11 | 8 | 54 |
| 2 | GIMSON | John | BURNET | Anna | GBR 21 | 6 | 5 | 5 | 7 | 7 | 2 | 2 | 1 | -8 | 8 | 1 | 4 | 18 | 66 |
| 5 | SAXTON | Ben | BONIFACE | Nicola | GBR 91 | 3 | 2 | 4 | 4 | 10 | 6 | -20 | 11 | 3 | 4 | 8 | 1 | 12 | 68 |
| 3 | LANGE | Santiago | CARRANZA | Cecilia | ARG 1 | 5 | 6 | 2 | 11 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 4 | -12 | 7 | 12 | 3 | 16 | 69 |
| 4 | WATERHOUSE | Jason | DARMANIN | Lisa | AUS 2 | 4 | -20 | 13 | 5 | 5 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 2 | 3 | 9 | 14 | 69 |
| 6 | KOHLHOFF | Paul | STUHLEMMER | Alica | GER 77 | 7 | 1 | 3 | 10 | 12 | -19 | 6 | 8 | 5 | 9 | 4 | 6 | 2 | 73 |
| 7 | BISSARO | Vittorio | FRASCARI | Maelle | ITA 5 | 2 | 10 | 6 | 1 | 13 | 8 | 4 | 13 | 6 | -18 | 11 | 2 | 4 | 80 |
| 8 | CENHOLT | Lin | LUBECK | Christian | DEN 71 | -19 | 4 | 11 | 2 | 9 | 5 | 18 | 2 | 13 | 3 | 2 | 7 | 10 | 86 |
| 10 | DELAPIERRE | Quentin | AUDINET | Manon | FRA 56 | 9 | 12 | 9 | 12 | 11 | 10 | 9 | 5 | 9 | 1 | -14 | 5 | 6 | 98 |
| 9 | MARTINEZ | Iker | MASLIVETS | Olha | ESP 70 | -16 | 8 | 8 | 9 | 8 | 12 | 5 | 6 | 1 | 11 | 9 | 10 | 22 | 109 |
Nacra 17 – Tita & Banti Back to their Winning Ways
The 2018 World, European and just about every major regatta champions of Ruggero Tita and Caterina Banti have secured a commanding 12 point victory at the Test Event for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.
With only one result outside of the top ten, Tita and Banti grabbed the lead on the third day day of the regatta and their fourth placed finish in the double points medal race was enough to hold on to the gold medal.
Caterina Banti (L) celebrates with helm Ruggero Tita (ITA) after securing victory at Ready Steady Tokyo
While the Italian’s had a sizeable gap to the remainder of the fleet, second to sixth overall were separated by only seven points and show the fleet is compressing in the latter half of the Olympic cycle.
Great Britain has again put on a podium filling regatta, with a tight battle between European Champions Ben Saxton & Nicola Boniface and their teammates John Gimson and Anna Burnet coming down to the final race of the regatta. However, it was Gimson and Burnet who had enough of a buffer heading into the medal race to hold on to second overall, with Saxton and Boniface just two points shy.
Gimson and Burnet finish the regatta with the most consistent scoreline in the Nacra17 fleet. With two wins, two seconds and discarding an 8th, the British Sailing Team has their work cut out for them deciding who to send to the games in August next year.
John Gimson and Anna Burnet (GBR) took second ahead of team mates Ben Saxton and Nicola Boniface
Within the British selection system, Saxton/Boniface felt they needed to leapfrog Gimson/Burnet to gain selection for Tokyo 2020. As such, they match raced in the pre-start and both teams found themselves on port tack in the final moments of the start. With starboard tackers to deal with, Saxton was the windward boat but was able to call for room to duck. Both boats ducked two starboard tackers and managed to just clear the starting vessel to safely begin the race before continuing to drag race to the far right-hand side of the course.
When both teams tacked, Gimson and Burnet were penalised and forced to take a 360º penalty turn. It was not immediately clear what their foul was, as they had been sailing in clear water for the previous few minutes, but it could have been a leftover foul from the pre-start that was only able to be clearly communicated after the boats were separated.
With the two British teams locked in battle, both Australia’s Jason Waterhouse and Lisa Darmanin and Rio 2016 gold medalists Santiago Lange and Cecilia Carranza Saroli had the opportunity to gain medal places. Though both teams were at times into second place overall, their decision to favour the right hand side of the windward leg didn’t pay, resulting in both missing out on medals by just 1 point, settling for 4th and 5th respectively.
With different winners at all major events this year, other than the Australians winning in both Miami and Palma, the Nacra17 fleet is growing tighter than ever before. As teams perfect, refine, and develop their foiling techniques on the challenging multihulls, there is no clear cut favorite for the gold in Tokyo.
The Sailing World Cup Enoshima begins on Sunday before we head to New Zealand in November for the 2019 World Championships, where Olympic qualification is on the line.
Results
1st Ruggero Tita / Caterina Banti (ITA) 54pts
2nd John Gimson / Anna Burnet (GBR) 66pts
3rd Ben Saxton / Nicola Boniface (GBR) 68pts
4th Jason Waterhouse / Lisa Darmanin (AUS) 69pts
5th Santiago Lange / Cecilia Saroli (ARG) 69pts
Full results are available at Nacra17.org/events/2019-test-event
Nacra17 Photo Gallery – https://nacra17.org/photos/
