Day 1 of the Great Britain Sail Grand Prix at Plymouth resulted in a stunning day for Pete Burling and the New Zealand team, who top the leader board after a race win and two second place finishes.
Phil Robertson and Team Canada won the opening race but dropped back to finish the day in fourth, while Tom Slingsby and the Australia team won the second race and finished the day second overall.
Sitting in third place, tied on points with Australia, are Quentin Delapierre and France after two third place finishes and a fifth.
Ben Ainslie and Great Britain finished fifth and will struggle to qualify for Sunday’s three-boat final . . . he knows the problem, his starting . . . Can he fix it?
Ainslie said: “It really wasn’t a great day for us, we made life really, really hard for ourselves with our starts, I mean, three bad starts. We actually did a good job after that to get back in it but we have left ourselves with a ton of work to do.”
Race 1 and a line-to-line win for Phil Robertson and Team Canada, with series leader Tom Slingsby and Australia down in sixth.
After a tight race it went right to the finish line with Canada taking a narrow win ahead of Pete Burling and the New Zealand team.
In third place it was Quentin Delapierre and France with Ben Ainslie bringing his Great Britain team home in fourth place.
Race 2 and it was a flying start for Pete Burling and the New Zealand team, but it was Phil Robertson and Team Canada leading at the first turn, with New Zealand getting a penalty.
Rounding in fourth were Australia and Tom Slingsby took them into the lead at gate 2. Great Britain struggled in last place.
Canada blew their chances with a crash-down at gate 4, damaging a spray fairing, eventually finishing last.
At the finish it was Slingsby and the Australia team first, 200 metres ahead of New Zealand, and then France and Ainslie bringing Great Britain home in fourth.
Race 3 and another disaster of a start for Ainslie rounding last at the first mark, while Pete Burling rounded first and begun to build a runaway lead for New Zealand.
Phil Robertson with Canada and Jimmy Spithill for USA were the early challengers, but it all went wrong for Spithill when they fell off the foils and dropped to last at gate 3.
Slingsby and the Australia team were back in seventh after the start but wiggled through to third by gate 4.
At the finish it was New Zealand all the way . . . with Nicolai Sehested and the Danish team taking second, and Canada third.
Ainslie finished sixth and will struggle to qualify for Sunday’s three-boat final.
The second day has two fleet races and ends with The Final – the last race of the event.
The last race of each SailGP event is The Final – a race in which only the three highest ranked teams in the event leaderboard face off to be crowned event champions.
