The World Match Racing Tour will once again go down to the wire, with at least 3 teams still in contention for the title of World Champion. The Argo Group Gold Cup set up the showdown, with The Wave Muscat Match Racing Team skippered by Australian Torvar Mirsky taking their second win in as many events.
The final was a thrilling 5-set match between Mirsky’s Racing Team and Sweden’s Johnie Berntsson. A win in the petit final for Francesco Bruni over Phil Robertson means just over six points now separate the trio of Ian Williams, Bruni and Mirsky with only the Monsoon Cup to go.
Mirsky is looking strong. After a few career distractions early in the year, this is perhaps his best chance of winning the World Match Racing Tour. The core team around him are all sailing well, due to high level competition in other series like the Extreme Sailing Series and America’s Cup World Series.
Mirsky was knocked out of the 2010 Gold Cup in the quarter-finals by Berntsson and more than avenged for that defeat this year. He said:
“We are over the moon with winning two titles in a row. We’ve never done that well in Bermuda and we’ve never had many Tour wins so this is fantastic, we’re really on a roll. I’m so proud of the way the team sailed this week, everyone just knew what they were doing on board and we felt comfortable and confident. Johnie really tested us in the final which made for some great sailing.
We are now close to Ian in the points and we have a big chance for the world title so we’ll be fighting for it! Hopefully we can keep on this roll and win in Malaysia too.”
Berntsson, who picked up 22 points for his win here to give his season a huge fillip, commented:
“We’re disappointed but it was a great performance overall. The finals were really tight and we felt like it could have gone either way. We collected too many penalties though and lost the last pre-start and that really cost us. Torvar did a great job and was tough to beat so congratulations to him.
“Maybe in an hour we’ll be happy but right now we’re really disappointed because we came so close to winning. We’ve got a 3 year aim to finish on the podium so we’re progressing well towards that.
“We’re happy to get an automatic invite to Malaysia. That was our goal.”
Overall Championship Standings – after 7 stages
- 1 Ian Williams (GBR) Team GAC Pindar – 106pts
- 2 Francesco Bruni (ITA) Bruni Racing – 100pts
- 3 Torvar Mirsky (AUS) The Wave Muscat – 99.8pts
- 4 Peter Gilmour (AUS) YANMAR Racing – 78.8pts
- 5 Bjorn Hansen (SWE) Mekonomen Sailing Team – 75pts
- 6 Damien Iehl (FRA) French Match Racing Team – 74pts
- 7 Johnie Berntsson (SWE) Berntsson Sailing Team – 73.2pts
- 8 Jesper Radich (DEN) Adrian Lee & Partners – 71.2pts
- 9 Mathieu Richard (FRA) French Match Racing Team – 69.6pts
- 10 Phil Robertson (NZL) WAKA Racing – 64.4pts
