After two days and four races at the World Disabled Sailing Championships at Cadiz in Spain, the Elite World Class Performance crew of Andy Cassell (from the Isle of Wight), Andy Millband (Isle of Wight) and Brian Harding (Southampton) have moved up into provisional second place overall in the twenty three strong Sonar fleet.

Following a third place in a very light wind race this morning (six to eight knots of breeze) Cassell, Millband and Harding turned on the power to make up for a moderate start in race two (the fourth race of the series) with an excellent windward leg in a freshening breeze to finish second behind the German crew of Jens Kroker, Peter Munter and Peter Reichl.

Cassell and his crew also profited from a number of overnight disqualifications in the fleet.

The second British crew of John Robertson (Sunderland), Ed Suckling (London) and John Long (Inverness) also looked in good form for a top five position in the first race until they got involved in an overlap incident with the American and Israeli crews. Robertson wisely elected to take a 720-degree turn in order to exonerate himself from any possible protests to finish eleventh. They made up for their mistake with a fourth place in race two.

In the 2.4 mR class, while the leading two boats have built up a significant points cushion, the rest of the fleet remain in close contention with RYA Team GBR’s Ian Harrison (Leicester), Mike Browne (London) and Kevin Curtis (Essex) lying in sixth, seventh and eighth overall respectively.

With three out of four of his results in the top ten, Harrison will be aiming for consistency in an extremely tough fleet.

“I think the standard of both the fleets is much higher. We have an ex- Americas Cup sailor in the Sonar fleet (Noel Robins) and an international Laser sailor (Hieko Kroger) in our fleet. The level of competition is comparable to any international sailing event, despite the fact we are all disabled”

“I would have like to have done better than the fourteenth today but if I can get some good races in over the next few days, I can drop that and I should be in a good position” said Harrison after racing

SPAIN: Cadiz: World Disabled Sailing Championships:
provisional results after day 2:
Sonar class (after 4 races)
1, Udo Hessels and Geert Ruesink and Mischa Russen (Ned) 6,2,1,3 – 12pts
2, Andy Cassell and Andy Millband and Brian Harding (GBR) 11,1,3,2 – 17pts
3, Carl Gustaf Fresk and Lars Bagge and Jan Edbom (Swe) 8,3,2,8 – 11pts
British Placings:
4, John Robertson and Ed Suckling and John Long – 13,6,11,4 – 24pts

2.4mR class (provisional after 4 races)
1, Heiko Kroger (Ger) 1,1,1,4 – 7pts
2, Phillippe Balle (Fra) 2,4,4,1 – 11pts
3, Jens Als Anderson (Den) 6,3,13,2 – 24pts
British Placings:
6, Ian Harrison – 3,8,14,7 – 32pts
7, Mike Browne – 20,5,6,20 – 41pts
8, Kevin Curtis – 9,10,7,16 – 42pts
12, Allan Smith – 8,17,12,11 – 48pts