Annalise Murphy secures Olympic place

The National Yacht Club’s (NYC) Annalise Murphy completed a major comeback to secure Ireland’s place in the Laser Radial class for the Rio 2016

Olympic Games

at the

ISAF Sailing World Cup

in

Santander

yesterday.

Benefitting from the surprisingly strong winds gusting up to 30 knots earlier in the day – at an event that has thus far been bereft of any real breeze – the strong-wind specialist scored 13th in the opening race, moving up to 20th overall and 16th by nation, in an event where the top-19 nations secure their places in Rio.

“I wanted to win a medal here but I’m happy to have earned a nation place at least,” Murphy said on coming ashore, conceding she had had a mixed regatta with some poor results in lighter winds.

The result adds a second nation place in the Laser, James Espey qualifying Ireland in the men's division last week.

The wind disappeared later in the day forcing the cancellation of the last two fleet races, leaving organisers no option but to conclude the series-three races short of the scheduled programme.

Ireland's 49erFX skiff representatives, Andrea Brewster and Saskia Tidey, endured an eventful day, breaking their mast in the strong winds before the start of the first race.

An emergency pit stop, aided by 49er team-mates, got the two women back on the water before the race restarted.

Once racing, congestion on the race course led to much place changing, particularly at mark roundings and the Irish team did well to finish 13th in the only race of the day and move to 34th overall.

Irish 49er sailors, Ryan Seaton and Max McGovern, repeated their first two results with a second and a 15th to move up to seventh overall, keeping their qualification prospects very much alive.

The Laser class gold fleet also ended their fleet racing phase, where Espey recorded a 38th to drift a little further in the overall rankings.

‘Big losers’

The big losers were the silver and bronze fleets where no racing occurred yesterday, thus ending their world championships with only five and four races completed respectively, leaving Finn Lynch in 101st position overall.

The Finn class fared best of all the fleets yesterday, completing three races. Irish Finn sailor Ross Hamilton lies 64th overall.

The forecast for today suggests a similar wind pattern to yesterday’s forecast with stronger winds in the morning but a complete drop off in the afternoon.