Laser Senior Worlds 12 - 20 September 2006

Report:  Day 8

Master triumphs

35 year old Michael Blackburn won his first Laser World Championship title after an exciting pre-start dual with the young, fellow Australian Tom Slingsby in the only race completed today in Jeju, Korea.

The early start of 0900 was postponed due to lack of wind with the fleet held on shore until the forecast easterly wind finally arrived at 1400. The 12 to 17 knot took an hour to settle after two attempted starts and one postponement the gold fleet final got away under a black flag at 1530 just 30 minutes before the cut off time for starting.

Going into the race Blackburn had the luxury of a 4th place as his discard whilst Slingsby was already discarding a 20th. Blackburn only needed to be in front of Slingsby or have Slingsby finish worse than 9th.

On every start the two chased each other around the start line. On the final start Slingsby started to leeward of Blackburn with another boat sandwiched between them. Within a few minutes of the start Slingsby had driven out from underneath Blackburn and Blackburn tacked away. When they next crossed Slingsby had the advantage but both were well buried in the fleet.

At the first mark Slingsby rounded 28th with Blackburn 56th Slingsby recovered to 17th and Blackburn finished 36th but the championship had been sealed just after the start.

Rasmus Mygren from Sweden made sure of third place by winning the race ahead of Michael Bullot NZL and Luka Radelic CRO.

Overall Results after 7 races and 1 discard:

1. Michael Blackburn AUS 16 pts
2. Tom Slingsby AUS 24 pts
3. Rasmus Mygren SWE 33 pts
4. Michael Leigh CAN 39 pts
5. Gustavo Lima POR 41 pts
6. Andrew Murdoch NZL 47 pts
7. Giles Scott GBR 49 pts
8. Paul Goodison GBR 51 pts
9. Milan Vujasinovic 53 pts
10. Deniss Karpak EST 56 pts

Full results: www.laserinternational.org

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