Perth, Australia (Dec. 16, 2011) — Anna Tunnicliffe’s Team Maclaren of Molly Vandemoer and Debbie Capozzi won the ISAF Sailing World Championships in Women’s Match Racing after defeating Lucy MacGregor (GBR) in four straight matches.
“We’re really excited right now,” said Tunnicliffe moments after getting onshore from the racecourse. Racing took place on Fremantle’s Inner Harbour in front of a large crowd of spectators lining the sea wall.
“It’s amazing, we’ve put a lot of effort into this year and had a lot of big events we had to get through and this has really topped off all our hard training,” Tunnicliffe said. “The team sailed really well, it was tricky conditions, conditions that we actually thought we were weakest in so we’re psyched we came out on top.”
This is the first match racing World Championship title for Tunnicliffe, Vandemoer and Capozzi as a team, although Capozzi won the Worlds three times previous with another team. Tunnicliffe and Vandemoer teamed up to win the Snipe Women’s World championship.
Debbie, Molly and Anna
Mark Medelblatt (Miami, Fla.) and Brian Fatih (Miami, Fla.) scored their first double digit result in race 10, a 10th, but will drop that result in their scoreline. They add an 8th in race 9 to hold the second placed overall behind Robert Scheidt and Bruno Prada (BRA). Mendelblatt and Fatih are the only US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics team to qualify for the medal race. George Szabo (San Diego, Calif.) and Mark Strube (Punta Gorda, Fla.) finished in 11th overeall, just 10 points out of the top 10.
In the 49ers, Erik Storck (Huntington, N.Y.) and Trevor Moore (North Pomfret, Vt./Naples, Fla.) climbed back into 5th overall after scoring 9-6-3. The high-performance skiff class will have three races on Saturday before Sunday’s medal race.
Racing continues on Saturday in the Laser, Men’s RS:X, and Women’s 470. The Star medal race takes place and will be carries live on the event’s website www.perth2011.com and click on “Perth 2011 live”
World Championship racing in the Women’s RS:X, Laser Radial, Men’s 470 and Finn classes were completed on Dec. 11. The Olympic Trials Tracker has been updated showing final points for all American competitors in those classes.
To follow the live blog from event organizers and link to live tracking, please visit http://www.perth2011.com/live-blog. For class results: http://bit.ly/PerthWMRresults
Follow the Athletes/ Follow the Team:
- Major daily highlights on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/USSTAG
- Live breaking news and results updated throughout the day on Twitter http://www.twitter.com/USSTAG
- Photo gallery http://olympics.ussailing.org/multimedia/photo-gallery
- Behind-the-scenes views about US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics from Team Leader Dean Brenner http://www.usstag.blogspot.com
- US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics roster http://sailingteams.ussailing.org/Events/Perth_2011.htm
About ISAF Sailing World Championships: This event serves as the second and final U.S. Olympic Team Selection Event in the nine Olympic fleet racing events. It is also the country qualification regatta where USA will look to secure an Olympic berth in all 10 Olympic events. Full results: http://www.perth2011.com/results
The event: More than 5,000 officials, 1,200 sailors and tens of thousands of spectators are expected to visit Western Australia for the two-week regatta (Dec. 3-18) where world champions in each of the 10 Olympic sailing events will be determined.
About US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics
The US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics is managed by the United States Sailing Association (US SAILING), the national governing body for the sport of sailing and sailboat racing. The top boats in each Olympic and Paralympic class are selected annually to be members of the US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics. US SAILING supports these elite athletes with funding, coaching and training. The title sponsor of the team is AlphaGraphics; other sponsors include Rolex Watch USA, Atlantis WeatherGear, Sperry Top-Sider, LaserPerformance, Harken Team McLube, Trinity Yachts, New England Ropes, Group Experiential Learning and Bow Down Training. For more information about the US Olympic and Paralympic Sailing Program and the US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics, please visit: http://sailingteams.ussailing.org.
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Editors Notes: All photos credit: Ocean Images/Perth 2011
Online photo gallery: http://usstag.photoshelter.com/gallery/ISAF-Sailing-World-Champs-in-Perth/G0000gNUVp7g5KqY/
Press contact: Dana Paxton, US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics, danapaxton@ussailing.org, mobile: +1 401-369-0490 (in AUS Nov. 27-Dec. 19)
