The Laser worlds were held in Boltenhagen, Germany from May 2nd to May 10th. I finished 140th out of the 168 boats that were in the event. I was 28th in bronze fleet just making the top half. I was pleased with that. The full results can be found here.
Ricardo, I and our coach Al landed in Hamburg, then Ricardo and I picked up our new boats from the Laser Dealer in Hamburg. We stacked both of them on top of our rental car and headed up north to Boltenhagen. The place that we were staying was a nice sort of cabin house. It had a big open living room/ kitchen which was great for putting on sail numbers. From our house it was about a 10min drive to the sailing center which was on the other side of the town. The nice thing with staying where we were was that we were right beside the gym and grocery store.
We were lucky to have about 10 days of training before the event started. For the first three of those the wind was over the land from light to 12kts and shifty. However for the remaining days of training there was a sea breeze and it was between 15kts and 28kts depending on the day. It was the kind of place that when you went outside you know that it was windy because there was this whistle in the air. Ricardo and I came to call it the howl. Every morning it was there until we started racing!
There was almost no wind on the day of the practice race. Ricardo and I went out, started, did an upwind and down wind leg before the wind completely died and we got towed in. The first day of actual racing was a bit winder to start but was dying by the end of the day. Race one was one of my best of the event, I started at the pin, flipped on to port right away and got a bit of a lane. After tacking a few more times on some shifts I rounded to top mark in 20th. By the end of the race I had bled some boats and was back to 35th. The next race was similar to the first but with a bit lighter wind.
Over the following next three days of the qualifying series we got off all the races that were scheduled. The wind was quite similar, light with almost no hiking breeze. The forth and final day of qualifying was by far the coldest day of sailing that we had had the whole event. It had been cold during all the training and that did not surprise us because we are in north Germany very early in the year. At the end of qualifying I was sitting 155th and would be sailing the rest of the event in bronze fleet. Ricardo had made it into silver fleet which was great for him as it meant that he would have a shot at getting an Olympic spot.
The temperature was warming up for the three days of finals and with that came some more wind. Day one of finals was still quite light but by the end of day two we were hiking. on the last day we were full out hiking but the wind still did not ever get over 18kts.
I had some great races in the finals. In the very first race I was forth around the top mark but lost it all on the second up wind when the wind from the right and I was on the left. The next race was also good for me I got a top ten. The next day I had a great start, starting at the boat and going right. I got a nice shift and was 2rd to the top mark. I lost one boat on the second beat and finished the race 3rd. My second race of the day was similar to the first one I missed a shift and was 22nd in the race. The last day of the event was the windiest one that we had had. It was still a land breeze and was really shifty. I had two solid races and a great start in the last race.
This was my first Laser World Championship and I was happy with how it went. There were some times that I would have liked more wind. Now we are spending some time being tourists in Berlin before we head over to Holland for the Delta Loyd Regatta.
-Kyle
