Very proud to announce that yesterday I won the RS Aero World Championships in Weymouth as part of the RS Games, one of the largest sailing events ever held!
It truly was a superb week full of tough racing, wacky conditions and great onsite support & activities. The fleet was huge; 206 Aeros in total with 103 in the 7 fleet alone. Split fleet racing was required and was very tough with Aeros firing in from all sides of the course at any moment which made it essential to pick the right time to tack back in.
The 5 day long event started off with light winds before progressively getting windier as the week went on. By racing on Friday we had gusts over 30 knots during racing which made it a wild ride onboard but great fun with smiles all round.
I put quite a bit of time before the event figuring out some good settings for high and low modes and it was very pleasing to see during racing that I had great upwind speed, allowing me to work my way to the front of the fleet even when things did go pear-shaped!
Downwinds were great too and the wider angles I were doing in the event really seemed to pay off. Don't be afraid to reach!
My starting generally was also very good with the exception of one race, which was also very pleasing as there were many many black flagged starts (usually a small weakness of mine seems to be picking up these!).
My boat was also working perfectly and I knew all the control lines inside out which always helps. I could have tweaked them mid-event as they were slightly out of range but decided to stick with what I knew and left them as they were. Used some great new ropes from Sailing Chandlery.
Overall it was a wonderful week full of great racing, great conditions and great people. It feels great to be world champion and I look forward to hopefully defending my crown next year!
