Day 4 of the Rolex Miami OCR seemed like a repeat of the last few days with 6-10 knots and shifty conditions.
Race 1 got off after a few postponements and we got a pretty good start near the pin end. We werent able to hold our lane so well and we had to tack out to find another. We worked our way left and were able to round in the top 10. We worked our position and managed a few passes to take 7th at the line.
Great news was that 1st and 2nd places had bad results so with one regular race to go we were in 2nd!
Race 2 got off to a good start but unfortunately we couldnt find a lane to the left side and were playing catch up from the start. We sailed as hard as we could but in the end could only manage a 20th.
With the regular series over we stand in 6th overall with just the medal race left. Heres the breakdown:
1. ISR 7 60pts
2. AUS 11 61pts
3. SWE 338 61pts
4. GBR 828 62pts
5. FRA 44 68pts
6. USA 1713 70pts
7. GRE 81 81pts
8. FRA 27 88pts
9. AUT 3 92pts
10. FRA 7 93pts
Wish us luck!
Day 3 of the Rolex Miami OCR was a very important one with only 4 races left in the series. Conditions were very similar to what we’ve had he last few days and we were eager to have a good day.
Race 1 we got a pretty good start towards the pin end after much debate in the pre-start. We went a little too far left and missed our biggest opportunity to have a good top rounding and managed a top 15 rounding. We took the low lane on the reach and caught 3 boats to put us just off the top 10. We passed another 2 boats downwind and turned the corner for the final beat. We played to the right side of the fleet and looked good until we missed the final lefty. We were in striking position on the downwind but couldnt manage our position and we got caught jibing in the middle. We didnt lose but we didnt gain, and crossed the line in 11th. However 2 boats in front of us were OCS which moved us up to 9th.
Race 2 got off great but maybe a little too great… We had an awesome start at the boat end along with the Aussies and NED 77. NED turned around after the individual flag went up but us and the Aussies held tight. We tacked off to the right and then caught a great right shift to sail across the course on top of the fleet. We tacked in a near perfect lane on the top left to round 1 boat length behind 2x Silver Medalist Nick Rogers (who had to ask us for the course) but quickly managed a pass with some good kinetics. We got down in front of them and surprised jibed away from them to get away clean. They got jibed on by the Swedes and we were able to extend to the bottom mark. We played our position against the fleet on the upwind and continued to extend. On the reach we nearly doubled our lead and then came the final run. Hardly a word was said other than to jibe or where the marks were. We were in so much fear that we may have been OCS’d that not much was said. We held our breaths on the the final reach and stared at our coaches across the line to see what the reaction was. We crossed the line and BEEP we got a horn! 1st it was and our support team and coaches were ecstatic! We gave each other a big high five and a big fist pump for our solid day.
At the end of the day our 9-1 has put us in 4th with only a few points to a podium with one final day of racing to go before the medal race. Full results here.
With day 1 behind us we were excited about racing with a chance to catch up and that we did!
The day brought similar conditions to where we left off yesterday, light, shifty, and puffy with winners coming from the sides.
Race 1 we finally got a good start but unfortunately found ourselves going the wrong way with a big shift to the right. We played our way that way to consolidate and got in a good position to make a lot of gains. We had a good downwind and decent second upwind but made a big move at the last mark to pass 2 boats on a skewed run to take 14th.
Race 2 we decided to go for and we took it! We had an excellent start at the boat end and tacked away and extended with our group. We called a brilliant layline from a mile out and it was the perfect call to put us just in front of our AUT training partners. We battled with team AUT the rest of the race but in the end held them off to take the race win! Very pleased!
Race 3 we decided to follow our strategy of winning sides and took it to the pin. We nearly had a horrible start after being boxed out but funny enough were given a hole after the race winning Brits tacked out and we filled in. In front of us were the Aussies who we let go on a tack and they came 2nd. We slung it out to the left side to catch our shift to round in 4th, and managed to pass a boat to take 3rd.
All in all a very good day considering how difficult the conditions were. The scores are really tight and it will be a battle the whole rest of the event. Our good day has put us in 6th overall with only a few points to 3rd. Full results here.
Welcome back race fans!
Yesterday we were postponed onshore all day waiting for severe storms to pass over the race course. By the time they passed it was a little too late to get everything going so they just decided to call it quits.
So with today being the first official day of racing, everyone was pretty keen to get out and race now being 2 races behind in the series. Today brought pretty good winds from 6-14 knots but rather shifty which made for some interesting racing.
Race 1 we didnt have the best start but were able to eject and catch a lane going right where we thought the best pressure was. Unfortunately the left side paid off and we were caught in the back. We sailed pretty well catching up to 17th by the end.
Race 2 we again didnt get a very good start but were able to catch a shift near the top to round mid fleet which put us in a pretty good position for a good result. We had a tough first downwind but hit all the shifts on the next upwind to round in 7th. We held off the pack to the finish and were pretty happy with that one.
Race 3 again started with a bad start, and we got bounced around in the middle until the top mark. Luckily enough for us it was an inner and we were able to have a good downwind to put us in a good spot for the next upwind. We played the shifts pretty well to come back to a 12th.
At the end of the day we’re standing 13th which is pretty good considering how difficult the day was. We know we could have done better but tomorrow is always another day. For full results check here.
Miami Yacht Club is hosting this year’s 470 North American Championships here in Biscayne Bay and today was a great start to the event. The last week we had very low temperatures which has dropped the water temperature to some unknown degree for Miami. The warm weather was a relief and we saw 18-20 knots on the race course.
Racing was excellent with many of the top teams from Europe using this as a tune up for the OCR next week. Our speed was good and made okay decisions to have a 8-6-4 on the day. Our scores put us in 4th overall on the day.
Full results here.
Team MB would like to present the Logo or No Go Contest for our fans to have the opportunity to design our team logo for our 2012 Campaign!
Logo must include ‘Team MB’ and 2012. Inappropriate designs submitted will be removed.
Rules are simple:
1. Design your logo
2. Submit your design into our Team MB Facebook Fan photo sectionÂ
3. Fans will vote on what logo is the best and it will be the header on our website!
4. Winner gets one of our Team MB Sail bags
5. Runner up gets a signed photo of us sailing
*Contest ends January 31*
