Scott Whitman & Julia Dorsett (USA) have won the Rolex Miami OCR SKUD 18 Competition
Photograph:Walter Cooper / US Sailing
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Marni Lane, US SAILING (as amended by IACA), Miami, Florida, USA, Friday, 29 January 2010
After five days of racing on Biscayne Bay, gold, silver and bronze medalists were determined today in three Paralympic classes at US SAILING's 2010 Rolex Miami OCR, the second of seven stops of the International Sailing Federation (ISAF) Sailing World Cup 2009-2010.
USA racked up the most medals with four, followed by Canada with two and one apiece for Norway, Great Britain and The Netherlands.
The Rolex Miami OCR, which this year hosted 448 teams (633 athletes) from 45 nations, is one of the world's most competitive regattas for those hoping to claim a sailing berth at the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, and as such it offers hefty bragging rights for podium finishers as well as critical points on the Sailing World Cup circuit and for certain national team designations and rankings.
US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics (USSTAG) members Scott Whitman (Brick, N.J.) and Julia Dorsett (Boca Raton, Fla./ West Chester, Pa.) continued their winning streak by clinching the gold medal with a race to spare today.
USA's SKUD newcomers, Jen French (St. Petersburg, Fla.) and JP Creignou (St.Petersburg, Fla.) won a silver medal, which was impressive considering this is only the second event they've sailed together. French and Creignou won both races today, but in the first race, they were called OCS for starting prematurely. Dorsett and Whitman's second became a first, which gave them the win. They chose not to sail the last race out of fairness to the rest of the fleet. The Canadian team of John McRoberts and Brenda Hopkins rounded out the fleet with a bronze medal after posting a 2-2 today.
The race itself was a game of catch-up for Dorsett and Whitman who at first didn't know whether or not they were early at the start. To be cautious, they decided to restart to exonerate themselves. As they tried to catch up with the fleet, they hit another snag when they hooked a lobster pot, crash gybed and freed themselves off the line. They ended up rounding the mark in third, caught up with the Canadian team and fought them downwind to the finish.
"We pinned them out to the other side, had the leeward advantage and gybed back and beat them," said Whitman. He and Dorsett have been a dominant force in the SKUD-18 over the last year, winning Rolex Miami OCR and Sail for Gold in Weymouth, England, the venue of the 2012 Paralympic Games. Their 2012 Paralympic campaign is in full force, as they plan to compete in as many national and international events as they can.
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