July 13, 2016 (St. Petersburg Yacht Club) – As expected, the fight for the title of national champion broke out between the favorites of the championship – the current champion local Dmitry Samokhin and the crew of the Moscow yacht club “Pirogovo” of Anatoly Loginov. During the day, each of them scored a win.
At the end of the day, in the standings, Dmitry Samokhin (RUS 76) shortened its deficit to Anatoly Loginov (RUS 27): 13 points against the 11, and Marcus Brennecke (GER 11) is on tie with the leader. Vasiliy Senatorov (RUS 34) and Mikhail Semerkhanov (RUS 31) swapped their places (5th and 6th), Leonid Klepikov (RUS81) lost two positions (from the 9th dropped to 11th). The most spectacular breakthrough in the standings was made a crew of Petersburger Michael Chaykin (RUS 91): 18th place after yesterday’s race was changed to the current 10th.
The second racing day started on schedule. But two boats were immediately disqualified: Leonid Klepikov (RUS 81) and Hugo Steinbeck (SUI 311) were OCS. Anatoly Loginov (RUS 27) decided to immediately strengthen the status of the leader of the standings, and broke away. Only Marcus Brennecke (GER 11) was able to keep up.
On the second leg the wind began to drop, and there were no more bitter struggle in this race: Loginov finished first, Brenneke, with a slight delay – came second. Third place was taken by Vasiliy Senatorov (RUS 34).
As it turned out, in the second race at the very beginning the best decision was turn
right – as future winners did. Marcus Brennecke’s crew (GER 11) pursued Dmitry Samokhin (RUS76) to the finish. The second race ended before the deadline: wind changed direction, and the judges decided to shorten the race at one of the marks. At the end, Dmitry Samokhin came first, Marcus Brennecke – the second. Unexpectedly, SUI 311 Hugo Steinbeck, who was 16th in the first race and OCS and DNF later, came third. Perhaps the Swiss, who won the prestigious Grand Prix de Douarnenez this year finally managed to find “their game”.
Dmitry Samokhin: – We realized what we wanted. We took the start near the vessel, and wanted to go just right. Immediately after the start we made a turn as we wanted, and got us to “punch” the entire fleet, with one turn right at the mark, so rounded first with a good margin, and then on a downwind course we managed to hold the advantage. At the end of the downwind the course changed – there was a big dark cloud. Judges have decided, in my opinion – the right way, to shorten the distance and took the finish line after the gate. So, it turned out just upwind and downwind, that’s all.