Welcome back to the magnificent Mondello beach in Palermo for day 2 of the 2015 RS:X European Championships. The sunny skies and the stunning location make for an ideal backdrop to this important event in the RS:X racing calendar.
With just over one year left until the next Olympic Games in Rio, Brasil, the athletes in the Olympic RS:X class are at the peak of their performance. In fact, some have already taken their first steps towards Olympic glory but they’ve still got a long way to go and the competition is fierce.
Racing here is quite similar to Rio with both venues renowned for their light and shifty winds, making consistency a hard thing to achieve especially amongst such a high caliber fleet.
The action packed day started with the women’s fleet where a great tactical game was at play amongst some of the best windsurfers in the RS:X class. Charline Picon the 2014 World titleholder from France scored 9th in the first race but made a great come back securing a bullet in the second race. The stand out performance of the day belonged to Polish Bialecka Malgorzata and Israel’s Hadar Heller, who both scored a bullet and a second place finish. Consistency paid off for UK’s Bryony Shaw who now stands in 3rd overall after posting a second and a third. The main battle of the day was a clash of the Spaniards with Blanca Manchon lying just one point ahead of Marina Alabau.
After some exciting races for the women’s fleet it was time for the men to hit the water and fight it out for the first bullet of the day and they were right on time as the breeze built for the start.
A good start is crucial for all of the athletes, allowing them to get a good position on the course and hopefully maintain it around the race track – going for the favorable side of the start –the side that will pay off is key. There were some new “protagonists” today, as Fleischer Sebastian from Denmark, Galili Amir from Israel and Ivan Pastor from Spain took their chances to climb up the leaderboard.
The Championship still has a long way to go until the podium moment, so the competition is still wide open and the leader-board could change many times between now and the last day, so stay with us.
