SAILING:A LAST-MINUTE surge of entries boosted the turn-out to 989 athletes for the opening races of the Sail for Gold Regatta at the London 2012 Olympic Regatta venue at Weymouth yesterday.

The 11-strong squad from the Irish Sailing Association produced several notable results in a mixed bag for the day with Peter O’Leary and his substitute crew of David Burrows and German Frithjof Kleen having a fourth place in the Star class along with a 23rd and finished 13th out of 36 boats for the day. O’Leary’s rival contenders for the sole place in the class for 2012 are Max Treacy and Anthony Shanks who had a 17th and a disappointing 32nd in race two, and only salvaged that place from last place on the first leg.

The pair could take some comfort that their training partner, double Olympic Gold medallist Iain Percy also had a poor start to the regatta with a broken forestay for the first race that delayed his start by 90 seconds for the second.

Nevertheless, Percy managed to pull up the fleet to 20th place.

In the high-octane 49er skiff class, a 24th place in race three for Ryan Seaton and Matt McGovern belied their earlier performance that saw the pair deliver a fourth and an eighth place in their first flight of 27 boats.

The moderate sou’west breeze had freshened by their last race and although this normally favours the pair, a capsize at the windward mark ruined their chances of maintaining form and they were 17th overall last night.

Irish newcomers Ed Butler and Ben Lynch counted a 12th place in the same flight and were pleased with their downwind performance though acknowledged that their starting skills lacked polish.

Elsewhere on the seven courses on Weymouth Bay and Portland Harbour, Irish Sports Council World Class carded athlete Annalise Murphy opened her regatta in the Laser Radial with a 16th place and was best of the three Irish women in the 91-strong fleet. Tiffany Brien was 18th while Saskia Tidey had a 45th place.

Amongst the Men’s Laser single-handers, Chris Penney had a 46th and 39th while James Espey had a 29th but was scored ‘Did Not Compete’ in race two.

In the Finn, Ross Hamilton lies 41st out of 51 boats.