Ulsan PWA World Cup - Day 6
A dramatic final day but ultimately Iachino and Erdil clinch victory
On paper the final day of the Ulsan PWA World Cup would seem rather uneventful with the overall result of the event not changing — however that doesn’t tell the full story. The forecast always looked tricky for today and that’s exactly how it played out — resulting in just 8 heats being completed over a period of 6 hours. The outcome of the men’s standings was just 1 heat away from changing quite significantly, but ultimately the wind refused to play ball despite numerous efforts to gain a result. As a result several sailors were left with their hearts in their mouths as their result hung in the balance on the completion or non-completion of Heat 14. After being made to sweat it out for the entire afternoon the likes of Ross Williams (Tabou / GA Sails / Mystic) — 3rd in race one — Pierre Mortefon (Fanatic / North) — 4th — Malte Reuscher (JP / NeilPryde) — 6th — reigning world champion — Antoine Albeau (RRD / NeilPryde / Chris Benz) — 7th — and Steve Allen (Patrik / Severne) - 10th - were all able to breathe a sigh of relief, after quarterfinal exits, when the event was officially called off just before 5pm. In the women’s fleet Lena Erdil (Starboard / Point-7 / AL370) was also left breathing a sigh of relief after falling at the opening buoy in her semifinal, which would have almost definitely resulted in the 27 year old missing out on a place in the winners’ final, while potentially costing her the event victory. Immediately after coming off the water we quickly caught up with both Matteo Iachino (Starboard / Point-7) and Lena Erdil, who claim the opening victories of the year to take an early season lead in the race for the 2016 world titles: Lena Erdil reflects on a slice of luck and capturing the event victory: “I feel really lucky actually. It’s been a hard week with not much wind and a lot of tries at racing as well as battling it out with the seaweed. Today we were trying really hard again and I wouldn’t have qualified from my heat today if it wasn’t abandoned. I feel very happy and lucky.” Matteo Iachino picked up immediately from where he left off last season and had this to say: “I feel really good and really happy. It was a hard day because we were on the water for about 3 hours waiting for good conditions, but the wind was so up and down and there was also a lot of seaweed in the water, which made it even more difficult to deal with the pressure. I managed to avoid going over early in the quarterfinals and then I was leading my semifinal before it was cancelled, but I’m super happy. It’s the best possible start to the year.” That concludes the 2016 Ulsan PWA World Cup. The conditions have been extremely tricky over the last 6 days with it only being possible to complete one elimination in both the men’s and women’s fleets. We’ll be back again on the 7th June when the Men’s Slalom fleet will be in action again as they head to Costa Brava, Spain, for the second stop of the PWA Slalom World Tour. Result 2016 Ulsan PWA World Cup — Women’s Slalom 1st Lena Erdil (Starboard / Point-7 / AL360) 2nd Sarah-Quita Offringa (Starboard / NeilPryde / Maui Ultra Fins) 3rd Delphine Cousin (Starboard / Gun Sails) 4th Ça?la Kubat (Starboard / Point-7) 5th Fujiko Onishi (Starboard / Point-7) Result 2016 Ulsan PWA World Cup — Men’s Slalom 1st Matteo Iachino (Starboard / Point-7) 2nd Cyril Moussilmani (Starboard / Severne) 3rd Ross Williams (Tabou / GA Sails / Mystic) 4th Pierre Mortefon (Fanatic / North) 5th Julien Quentel (Patrik / Avanti) 6th Malte Reuscher (JP / NeilPryde) 7th Antoine Albeau (RRD / NeilPryde) 8th Gonzalo Costa Hoevel (Starboard / Point-7) 9th Pascal Toselli (99NoveNove / Challenger Sails) 10th Steve Allen (Patrik / Severne)