Olympic Games 1996

470 MEN - RACE 6 RACE REPORT - 27 July 1996

Race 6 for the 460 Men was started in a dying breeze with large and difficult patches of, and lack of, breeze.

As the crews pushed each other for the best start, five teams were judged over the line early, and with no one returning back to restart correctly ITA, SWE, EST, BRA and SLO were disqualified. This may have a very significant impact on the overall positions with two of the five disqualified - 1992 and 1988 Olympic medalists Tonu and Toomas Toniste (EST) and Marcus Westerlind and Henrik Wallen (SWE) - in second and third overall respectively going into todayÕs racing.

At the top mark for the first time was current European Champions Beryozkin and Burmatnov (RUS) who had established a lead of 12 seconds over Petri Leskinen and Mika Aarnikka (FIN). World ranked number one sailors, Andreas Kosmatopoulos and Konstantino Trigonis (GRE), rounded third 6 seconds later.

The strong tidal flow was beginning to have an impact on the course, with the first boats around the mark taking advantage of the southerly flow, to move away from the fleet, and into slightly stronger pressure. This was accentuated at the bottom gate, as the lead bunch of RUS, GRE, GBR, ARG, UKR, POL and FIN rounded some 3 minutes 57 seconds before the next boat, World Champions Ben and Jan Kouwenhoven (NED).

The main fleet managed to claw their way back to this lead group on the next leg, reducing the deficit to 1 minute 15 seconds at mark 2. No one was catching Beryozkin and Burmatnov (RUS) as they continued to extend their lead to over 40 seconds at mark 3, with just the reach to the finish remaining.

The final results were RUS, GRE, ARG, GBR, UKR, FIN, POL, POR, GER, NED.

After 8 races this leaves the overall standing as follows: Yevhen Braslavets and Ihor Matviyenko (UKR) in 1st place with 13 points on 2-2-3-1-(16)-5, in 2nd Dmitriy Beryozkin and Yevgeniy (RUS) with 24 points on 13-(25)-5-2-3-1 and in 3rd the Portuguese team on 34 points with scores of 5-10-(17)-7-4-8.

Yevgeniy Burmatnov attributed their victory to the fact that they picked the favoured right side of the course, "We got to the right as soon after the start as we could. We like these conditions, we are very fast. We will now be second overall, but hey, there are still three days to go."