Richard and Tom returned to the UK yesterday after finishing 20th at the 49er European championships in Zadar, Croatia. The team were particularly pleased because they got their first race win in a grade 1 international event.

Uskock sailing club hosted 62 sailing teams in the warm waters of the Adriatic sea. The first day and the sailors hit the water with winds from the northwest slowly building from 10 to 14 knots during the afternoon. With such excellent conditions, the Race Committee opted to run 4 races for each fleet.

Team Murka scored 3, 12, 5, 22, a good start and Richard and Tom gained some vital confidence. It seemed that their training before the event was paying off.

“We had a solid weeks training in Weymouth before the event with a couple of the top British squad guys.” Commented Tom. “It was obvious from the first race that we had made some serious speed gains in the lighter winds.”

Days 2 and 3 and Team Murka continued to put in solid results to qualify for the second part of the regatta in gold fleet, meaning that they would be racing the next 3 days with the top 25 teams in Europe.

First day of gold fleet and after a slightly disappointing first race Richard and Tom re-grouped and scored a first and a third in the final races of the day. This was the fist time the team has won an international race and they were thrilled.

Their coach, Harvey Hillary said:“This is how things start, a couple of top three results in an event then you become more and more consistent, until eventually you always finish in the top 3!”
“We were really pleased to win a race” Richard said afterwards, “Its not like we banged a corner and just ended up there either, we rounded the first mark 3rd, kept cool heads and sailed through to take the gun!”

The second day of gold fleet racing was warm but windy 15-20kts. Because the sailing location was in between the shore and an island around 2 miles away, the sea chopped up very quickly making conditions more difficult to sail in than they would usually be for the wind.

Even in the Gold fleet the breeze came as a bit of a shock and there were a few capsizes. Team Murka held it together finishing 22, 16, 19 in the first 3 races, but in the final race of the day a serious collision, with both parties at fault, meant that team Murka had to retire, meaning they scored 25.

The race committee were ahead of schedule and so there was only one race on the last day, which was probably a good thing because the wind was coming off the land which meant 25 degree shifts at random intervals.

Afterwards Richard said that: “The last race was a crazy one, we were definitely winning it at one point, but then I think almost everyone else in the fleet would tell you the same thing! It was really hard to spot the fast-moving shifts, but that type of wind meant that the fleet were unbelievably close the whole race, there was loads of place changing going on.”

Richard and Tom finished the event 20th. A good number of places higher than they finished last year in Palma (30th) and shows that they are making real gains now that they are full time sailors.

Their next event is the Skandia Sail For Gold Regatta beginning on the 14th September in Weymouth. It is shaping up to be a massive international event with all of the big names attending keen to train at the sailing venue for the 2012 Olympics.

Keep up to date on what’s happening at Sail for Gold by visiting the website: www.skandiasailforgoldregatta.co.uk