The medal race finals at the Princess Sofia World Cup of Sailing regatta in Palma take place on Saturday with no Irish crews in the line-up of any event for the first time in several years.
The outcome to the event stands in contrast to recent gains including championship podium results and consistently more of the Irish Sailing senior squad reaching gold fleet.
After plummeting from the overall lead on Thursday in the 49er skiff class, Ireland’s Robert Dickson and Seán Waddilove were unable to regain their earlier form to salvage a result from the event that had appeared so promising.
Ironically, several of the class leaders had started the 12-race series where the Irish crew have ended overall – 20th place – underlining how gains and losses can be reversed in the light conditions.
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Three races on Friday might easily have seen Dickson and Waddilove win a place in the medal race final but needed their form to deliver more race wins like they had on Wednesday.
There were similar stories in the two other events that Ireland had gold fleet contenders competing in.
Finn Lynch in the ILCA7 single-handers was unable to improve from 20th overall on the final day and slipped back to 25th at the finish. The result masked some impressive boat-speed performances and his ability to claw back places from behind in races was a positive takeaway.
Like his ILCA6 women’s counterpart, Eve McMahon, who ended 35th, both had black flag disqualifications from their opening races sucking up their sole event discard and carrying that in the mind is an added penalty to overcome.
From early coaching feedback, across all three Irish disciplines, there are generally positive observations about boat-speed abilities in most conditions.
However, the other two critical ‘B-elements’ of the performance formula – brain and body – could become the focus of preparations for the coming season, notably for the single-handers who have only had two weeks recovery time from their peak event at the European Championships.
