Britain’s Hannah Snellgrove went from Zero to Hero on the first day of gold fleet racing at the Radial Worlds in Japan.
The British sailor was disqualified by the black flag on the first race start Monday, but then bounced back with her first ever race win at a world championship in the second race.
Before the championship, Snellgrove, 29, from Lymington, commented, “I’d love to break into the top ten at a worlds as I’ve fallen just short of that a few times, so that would be a great hurdle to overcome.”
She has done that in spades! The win, her second top ten finish of the week puts her in 22nd overall with four races still to go.
After racing overall leader Josefin Olsson of Sweden, who had finished second in the first gold fleet race (R6), was disqualified.
As she had retired from the second race, this forced her to count one of the high scoring results, resulting in her dropping to 12th overall and possibly out of contention for the title.
Winner of the first gold fleet race (R6) was Louise Cervera of France with Finland’s Monika Mikkola in second place, and Charlotte Rose of the USA in third.
Second behind Snellgrove in race 7 was the defending champion Emma Plasschaert of Belgium, with Ecem Güzel of Turkey in third to take first place overall.
Following the disqualification for Olsson, the new leader is Ecem Güzel with a six point lead from Tuula Tenkanen of Finland, and with Marit Bouwmeester of Holland now in third place.
Paige Railey of the USA is fourth, Anne-Marie Rindom of Demark fifth and Charlotte Rose USA sixth.
Britain’s Alison Young, the 2016 champion, is ninth overall after 25 and 6th places, with team-mate Georgina Povall now in 28th after a 37 and 28.
Two races are scheduled daily before concluding the world championship on Wednesday.
In the men’s Radial World Championship after 8 races:
Zac West (5,2) of Australia leads after eight races with 20 points.
In second place is Simon de Gendt (1,1) of Belgium on 30 points, and third is Mark Loius (4,3) of Australia with 37 points. Perez Guilherme (13,9) of Brazil is in fourth place with 51 points.
Radial – Women’s World Championship after 7 races 1 discard – UPDATED (111 entries)
1st TUR 215399 Güzel Ecem 12 8 5 7 8 9 3 – – 40 pts
2nd FIN 212072 Tenkanen Tuula 17 4 7 12 1 48 5 – – 46 pts
3rd NED 210407 Bouwmeester Marit 5 15 4 5 8 23 10 – – 47 pts
4th USA 197111 Railey Paige 5 5 2 2 22 20 15 – – 49 pts
5th DEN 215501 Rindom Anne-Marie 1 BFD 28 1 4 12 4 – – 50 pts
6th USA 211540 Rose Charlotte 7 11 22 4 3 3 47 – – 50 pts
7th BEL 211552 Plasschaert Emma 21 16 1 6 14 14 2 – – 53 pts
8th FRA 206297 Barrue Marie 2 16 13 12 39 4 7 – – 54 pts
9th GBR 206251 Young Alison 30 8 9 4 12 25 6 – – 64 pts
10th FRA 213939 Bolou Marie 3 1 17 24 3 18 36 – – 66 pts
11th NED 212980 van der Vaart Daphne 13 7 19 8 10 24 11 – – 68 pts
12th SWE 216251 Olsson Josefin 1 2 3 5 2 DSQ RET – – 70 pts
13th ITA 214152 Floridia Joyce 24 1 6 15 21 31 8 – – 75 pts
14th FIN 203033 Mikkola Monika 2 22 19 9 21 2 39 – – 75 pts
15th POL 210786 Barwinska Agata 19 18 17 1 10 50 14 – – 79 pts
16th GRE 214958 Fakidi Athanasia 15 6 7 27 11 29 13 – – 79 pts
17th ARG 213977 Falasca Lucía 6 17 18 18 13 8 31 – – 80 pts
18th TUR 215494 Donertas Nazli Cagla 26 25 5 3 7 15 32 – – 81 pts
19th NOR 213841 Flem Høst Line 3 3 2 18 23 33 46 – – 82 pts
20th USA 184454 Reineke Erika 20 3 21 14 19 5 BFD – – 82 pts
21st CRO 215849 Vorobeva Elena 26 20 1 19 7 10 41 – – 83 pts
22nd GBR 215817 Snellgrove Hannah 29 13 20 8 14 BFD 1 – – 85 pts