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VOLVO Optimist Open Dutch Championship 2002
Fresh from being selected for the European Team, James Murdock and Claire Lasko returned home on Monday evening, quick kit wash and boat check and back on the road early on Wednesday morning to catch a ferry. Claire went via Dover and James via Harwich. Claire and James are old hands at the Dutch Nationals with this being the 3rd visit for James and the 4th for Claire. Wednesday evening was
registration, measurement and then we saw who was going to participate.
239 boats from 12 countries came for the 4 day event from the 9 – 12th
May. The Croatians, Slovenians and
Poles brought their top sailors to compete at Workum on the Iijsselmeer.
It is a huge expanse of water with generally steady winds and a very
steep chop once the wind reaches force 4. We
did not have a support RIB, but the Dutch were most friendly and allowed us to
go afloat with them. My thanks go
to the Pelt family for their patience with me and enabling Claire and James to
use their RIB as a base between races. This event gave us
the opportunity to race against some of the best sailors in Europe.
The early leader board was dominated by Poles. Slovenians and Croats
along with the Dutch hosts. It was
going to be another battle between the seasoned 15 year olds and the up and
coming 12 year-olds. After 10 races
with only one discard it was the Slovenian and Croat juniors who tied on an
incredible 13 points with Nik Pletikos from Slovenia winning the tie break
against Philip Matika from Croatia. The
seniors filled the next places with Lasko finishing 10th, 3rd Junior
and 2nd girl. Murdock
finish 25th having had to retire in one of the races. We stayed on to watch
the prize giving and saw the size of the competitive Dutch sailors who continue
to win races in light to medium conditions and are devastating when the wind
gets up. It will be interesting to see how these 15 year olds do at
the Europeans and World events. Maybe
our seniors should talk to them and see how they do it – mental attitude and
the type of kit used. Then the usual drive
to the ferry port in order to be back at school the next day. Final Places 1
SLO
Nik Pletikos
12
13 pts
1,2,1,1,1,(4),1,1,3,2 2
CRO
Philip Marika
12
13 pts
1,1,1,(6),2,1,1,2,1,3 3
NED
Steven Le Fevre
15
21 pts 9,3,1,1,1,3,1,(12),1,1 4
NED
Mandy Mulder
15
F
25 pts
1,2,2,2,1,1,3,9,4,(12) 5
POL
Lukasz Przbytek
13
26 pts 1,2,5,4,1,3,6,(9),3,1 6
NED
Lars Bekker
15
29 pts
(9),4,2,3,5,5,3,4,2,1 7
POL
Mateusz Hanke
13
33 pts
4,8,2,4,3,1,5,1,5,(28) 8
POL
Tomasz Januszewski
14
33 pts 2,(25),3,2,7,2,2,1,5,9 9
NED
Gijs Pelt
13
39 pts
(10),8,2,5,3,4,6,3,2,6 10 GBR Claire Lasko 12 F 42 pts (21),5,5,3,8,6,4,3,4,4 25 GBR James Murdock 14 83 pts 6,11,7,6,9,15,11,(dnf),6,12 |
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