Board sailor keeps gold hopes alive

Press, 24 September 1988, Page 28

Board sailor keeps gold hopes alive

PA Pusan The New Zealand Olympic board sailor, Bruce Kendall, kept a shine on his gold medal prospects yesterday, staging a remarkable recovery to finish fifth in the fourth race and retain his commanding over-all lead.

And the Flying Dutchman team-mates, Murray Jones and Greg Knowles, took a clever punt on their last beat to haul back 10 boats. They finished fourth to hold clear second place over all, but rivals Jorgen BojsenMoller and Christain Gronborg, of Denmark, took second again to pull further ahead with results of 1-4-2-2 compared to the Kiwis’ 2-1-9-4. The Tornado class defending champions, Rex Sellers and Chris Timms, saw their gold medal hopes slip away when they took fourth place behind France, U.S.S.R. and Brazil. The New Zealanders stay second over all on 10-3-1-4 results but have the Brazilian and Soviet crews breathing down their necks. And the French wizards, JeanYves Le Deroff and Nicholas Henard, have a clear lead with 1-2-2-1 places. “We really needed to win today,” Sellers said.

Stuart Childerley, of Great Britain and the world champion, Thomas Schmid, in fourth will be racing for silver unless Jose Luis Doreste, of Spain — the clear leader on 7-3-1-2 results — falls apart in a big way. The news was less encouraging for Kiwis in three other classes. The women’s 470 crew, Fiona Galloway and Jan Shearer, could not get to the favoured right side of the course on the vital first beat and ran out thirteenth to pick up one place to tenth over all. Out in front, Allison Jolly and Lynne Jewell, of the United States, were second for 3-1-1-2 results and a commanding lead. The Soling crew, Tom Dodson, Aran Hansen and Simon Daubney, struggled in the shifting 12 to 14knot winds, slipping back to sixteenth at the finish. They drop to nineth over all from fifth and now need top results in the last three races to have any hope of a medal. Peter Evans and Simon Mander, also in trouble with the shifts, found themselves underpowered as well. They finished a very disappointing eighteenth and slip two places to eighth over all. Aucklander Kendall

kept clear of trouble in the 45-boat start melee, opting for the lessfavoured left side of the line rather than risking collision and disqualification. “I wanted to keep right out of it,” he said. “Once you’re in a commanding points position its still better just to keep clean.” The Los Angeles bronze medallist rounded the top mark in nineteenth place, but showed his remarkable speed on the next four legs to pass 13 others. Jle picked up one more place to cross the line fifth behind the winner, Carlos Iniesta, of Spain, the Italian Francesco Wirz, the French speedster Robert Nagy and Bart Verschoor, of the Netherlands. All but the Spaniard have a chance to catch Kendall and gold, but his 3-3-1-5 results give him a useful 13-point cushion The American Mike Gebhardt is still provisionally second over all but should slip down to fifth or so when his third-race points are sorted out. Gebhardt, given a faulty dagger-board on Thursday and now seeking redress, was twelfth in yesterday’s race. “I don’t think he’ll be hassling me again,” Kendall said.

The day’s big improver was the Finn sailor, John Cutler, who recovered from fourteenth to finish fifth and shoot up to third over all as other leaders tumbled down the rankings. Cutler, second-placed