Scoring a 1/5 yesterday on the last day of qualifying, Tom Slingsby AUS leads all comers before the decisive final phase at the Laser Worlds in Hayling Island GBR, where the fleets are now split into gold, silver and bronze. On a sparkling summer day, moderate easterlies from 8-11 kn that were accompanied by decent swell, the downhillers in the 159-boat fleet clearly were in their element. Confessing to schoolboy errors, as he called his mistakes, Olympic and defending world champion Paul Goodison GBR finally bagged a double-digit score in Race 7. Yet he sits in second, 14 points adrift of Slingsby and two ahead of the two top Kiwis (there are two more in the top eight), Michael Bullot NZL and Andrew Maloney NZL. In 5th the man of the day, Pavlos Kontides CYP, who makes his home in nearby Southampton GBR as a student, rolled two firsts yesterday.
After a layday, the Junior World Championships resumes qualifying with two more races before their four-race finals commence Saturday. In the lead here is Francesco Marrai ITA. The report, all results and the video channel.
