Match
Game We are
a bit late with this (d'oh!) but it is Chris Law's wrap up from
the Portugal
Match Cup. Enjoy. OK, so we didn't make the semifinals. I feel pretty disappointed as we were on a roll. But the reality is it's a pretty high expectation and even quite arrogant to expect to throw a team together that has not even met each other. I had 2hrs practice and be amongst the top four skippers in the world and make the semifinals of an event of this caliber! I'm sitting now watching Dickson and Gilmour go at each other on one side of the semifinal and Jes Gram-Hansen, who's currently the No.1 choice for Mascalzone Latino and Magnus Holmberg who's the skipper and helmsman of the Victory Challenge and it would've been great to have been out there but frankly we were just outclassed. However, having not made the semifinals, you go to the playoffs for a fifth - eighth and I was up against yet again Thierry Peponnet, who until this morning thought he was the helmsman of K-Challenge. We got him over the line and went on to win the match and then played another Frenchman, Mathieu Richard in the battle for fifth and sixth and I got another peach of a start, went what we thought was the right way, only to see the little guy get a massive right shift and reach into the top mark from the right side, and I never got back in touch. So we finished sixth, not bad you could say but I still feel competitive enough at this game to be disappointed. So who's going to win it? Dickson is leading comfortably against Peter Gilmour and although it's the best of 5, I cannot see him coming back to win that. And then I honestly feel Magnus is sailing so well at the moment I can see him winning against Gram-Hansen. As we speak he is one up. So I'd say Dickson to win, Magnus Holmberg second. Peter Gilmour will probably win the play off but most of that is pure guess work. By the time you read this you'll know. So what am I going to do next? I'd like to be a match-racing coach, B boat helmsman or sparring partner in a two boat programme in the AC, responsible for broadening the match-racing understanding and awareness right through the team. That might mean that I go and do the circuit myself, taking with me guys who need the experience or I might just go along as a coach myself. I don't frankly want to spend my whole time in Valencia so I guess I'm looking to do 3-6 months over the next 12 in whatever Cup programme thinks I can be of most value. So for now
I sign off in beautiful blue sky, sunny Cascais, where I first came
35 years ago to do the Finn Gold Cup, there were 188 boats, I was
17 yrs old and I remember I came 44th, what a lovely place this is
to sail and I hope this event goes on to grow in stature as the event
to win, just like the British Open Golf Tournament. Congratulations
to the sponsors and organisers for a great event. |