Optimist World Championship
23 - 3 August 2003 Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, SPAIN
Top Two Forge Ahead
Two further races were sailed in 13-14 knots, a wind increase which benefited the heavier teams such as Poland. With eight races sailed one discard has now been taken.
Royal Lymington Y.C. sailor Greg CAREY (GBR) continued to sail superbly but, in the happy position of having a low discard, has for the moment slipped one point behind Sebastian Peri BRUSA (ARG). A ten point gap has now opened up between these two and defending champion Filip MATIKA (CRO) but the field is then very close with good days from Jesse KIRKLAND (BER), Peruvian Brenko MARKOVINOVIC and Tomasz JANUSZEWSKI (POL) raising them on the leaderboard.
Girls favourite Hannah MILLS had an OCS and will have to be both careful and fast for the rest of the regatta. In the meantime Peruvian "veteran" Tania ZIMMERMANN is best girl following a disappointing day for Alessandra Ferlich (ITA).
Lukasz PRZYBYTEK (POL), who seemed well out of contention with a DSQ and two OCSs in the first five races, has admirably refused to give up and scored 2 and 3 for the day.
Today, the individual racing is suspended for two days to allow the team racing championship and a rest day.
16 teams qualify for the team racing on the basis of results in the first five individual races. Top four seeds are Italy, 2002 silver medallists Croatia, Japan and Great Britain, but no one should underestimate the traditional specialists Argentina and Peru. 2002 bronze medallists China rather surprisingly failed to qualify and the surprise (and delighted) qualifiers are the relative novices of Chile. Full seeding at the IODA website below.
Full results are available on the event website at the address below.
Top Ten
| Pos | Nat | Name | Tot | R1 | R2 | R3 | R4 | R5 | R6 | R7 |
| 1 | ARG 2660 | SEBASTIAN PERI BRUSA | 17 | 5 | 2 | 31 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 3 |
| 2 | GBR 5176 | GREG CAREY | 18 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 8 | 10 | 4 | 2 |
| 3 | CRO 849 | MATIKA FILIP | 28 | 3 | 9 | 1 | 1 | 23 | 12 | 2 |
| 4 | SWE 3979 | NICKLAS DACKHAMMAR | 32 | 18 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 4 | 43 |
| 5 | BER 1183 | JESSE KIRKLAND | 35 | 11 | 4 | 13 | 2 | 14 | 4 | 1 |
| 6 | PER 246 | BRENKO MARKOVINOVIC | 36 | 1 | BFD | 9 | 13 | 4 | 3 | 6 |
| 7 | POL 1718 | TOMASZ JANUSZEWSKI | 38 | 4 | 12 | 14 | 32 | 3 | 1 | 4 |
| 8 | CRO 799 | ZAHTILA ALBERT | 41 | 15 | 27 | 4 | 7 | 3 | 11 | 1 |
| 9 | JPN 2883 | RYUTARO KAWAI | 44 | 4 | 10 | 2 | 11 | 6 | 11 | 17 |
| 10 | CHN 305 | WEI NI | 45 | 2 | 3 | 36 | 6 | 11 | 7 | 16 |
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Source: http://www.sailing.org/Article_content.asp?ArticleID=5043
