Day 4 of and the cut-off (top 10) for the weekend Medal races is now the focus at the French Olympic Sailing Week in Hyères.
It was a day of shifting winds if not always fortunes, starting with unstable 6-8 knot south-westerlies and building slightly and stabilising by the late afternoon. The forecast for Friday and Saturday is for 18-20 knot westerlies.
In the women’s RS:X, after three more races, Charline Picon (4,1,4) of France recovers the lead and is ten points clear of Peina Chen of China, with Yunxiu Lu, also of China, a further nine points back in third place.
Britian’s Emma Wilson (9,3,5) moves into fourth but with a 19 point gap to the podium places. Bryony Shaw (5,9,9) slips a place to ninth and Saskia Sills is in 16th place.
In the men’s RS:X Mattia Camboni (1,8,7) of Italy extends his lead to 24 points ahead of countryman Dan Benedette, both taking race wins.
Poland’s Piotr Myszka is third, to move ahead of Thomas Goyard of France, now in fourth place.
Not a good day for Britain’s Kieren Holmes-Martin (22,20,13) or Tom Squires (14,11,5) but they remain in the top 10 at seven and eight respectively. Andy Brown is now in 12th and Matt Barton 13th.
The Laser event is now in gold and silver fleets and Australia’s Matt Wearn (2,1) opened his lead to eight points, ahead of Luke Elliott (1,6) with Tom Burton moving into third place.
Overnight leader Sam Meech of New Zealand had his worse day (13,13) to drop to fourth overall.
Britain’s Luke Elliott (6,2) is in seventh, Michael Beckett eighth, and Nick Thompson (11,16) slips back to 11th.
Three races for the Laser and Radial are scheduled for Friday.
In the women’s Radial, Maria Erdi of Hungary has a one point lead ahead of Finland’s Tuula Tenkanen.
This pair have a 17 cushion back to third placed Paige Railey of the USA with Emma Plassschaert of Belgium in fourth.
Britain’s Alison Young, still on the tail end of recovering from injury, has withdrawn from the event.
Friday is the final day of fleet racing with the top ten of each fleet taking part in Medal races on Saturday.
