The Lanzarote iQFOil Games finished Saturday with a heart-stopping Final and fantastic sailing conditions.
Britain’s Sam Sills, who had clearly dominated the entire championship, met Poland’s Pawel Tarnowski and Frenchman Nicolas Goyard in the winner-takes-all final.
Sills was gaining on Tarnowski as the raced at high speed towards the finish, when with 20 metres to go, Tarnowski crashed and a second later Sills also crashed.
But it was Tarnowski who managed to recover first and cross the line for victory with Sills second and Goyard third.
In the women’s event Spain’s Pilar Lamadrid, number 1 in the world ranking, claimed her first victory of the season and her second Lanzarote title in a row in the Canary Islands.
Lamadrid and the Israeli Shahar Tibi managed to advance to the Final to meet the provisional leader, Sharon Kantor (ISR), who automatically pre-qualified Friday.
After a good start, Lamadrid led off the start, a position she never lost to cross the finish line first and claim victory at the Lanzarote iQFOIL Games.
Tibi finished in second while U21 Sharon Kantor took the bronze.
Of the other British Sailing Team members competing, Islay Watson was seventh in the women and Andy Brown took tenth in the men.
iQFOil Games 2023 – Men – Final after Medal Race(84 entries)
1st POL 182 Pawel TARNOWSKI
2nd GBR 60 Sam SILLS
3rd FRA 465 Nicolas GOYARD
4th ISR 253 Yoav COHEN
5th ISR 60 Tom REUVENY
6th NED 465 Huig Jan TAK
7th GER 220 Sebastian KOERDEL
8th NED 9 Kiran BADLOE
9th ITA 60 Daniele BENEDETTI
10th GBR 360 Andrew BROWN
iQFOil Games 2023 – Women – Final after Medal race (66 entries)
1st ESP 12 Pilar LAMADRID
2nd ISR 3 Shahar TIBI
3rd ISR 390 Sharon KANTOR U21
4th ISR 2 Daniela PELEG U21
5th ISR 32 Katy SPYCHAKOV
6th FRA 775 Cousin DELPHINE
7th GBR 529 Islay WATSON
8th ISR 7 Maya MORRIS
9th CRO 991 Palma ČARGO
10th ITA 157 Marta MAGGETTI