A Full action start for the 2021 ENEL IFCA Slalom European championship in sunny Sardegna Spiaggia di Sottotorre, Calasetta. [more]

The 2021 IFCA Slalom European Championship could not start in a better way. The nice Maestrale wind was present on the venue right from the morning and yet with a beautiful summer sun. 34 competitors from 7 nations have gathered on the beautiful sunny beach to make the registration in the morning while the race crew was busy preparing all for the slalom races.

No time was lost and at 14:00 sharp the first heat of elimination number one was started. In about 15 to 20 knots of wind, the racing was packed with interesting racing action. Choppy conditions did not make the jibing easy and so one saw many position changes at the marks. But it was Basile Jacquin FRA who took the lead after race number one followed by Bruno Martini ITA and Malte Rauscher GER.

While in the woman fleet the first race was won by the strong and upcoming Olivia Rosique FRA followed by Tuesday-Lou Judd FRA and Fabienne Hoogendam NED.

As the first racing course was relatively short the race officer Claudio Alesandrello made a slight course change to make the reach longer and the wind started to be a bit more unstable which made the competition a bit more tricky. In heat two for some unknown reason, the whole group sailed to the wrong mark and the heat was abandoned. It was a unlucky moment for Bruno Martini ITA who encountered a breakage of the foot strap and was forced to go on shore to change the board, but did not make it to the restart of his heat on time. To add the drama also the winner of elimination one Basile Jacquin FRA made a wrong gear selection and failed to qualify for the final. It was Malte Rauscher GER who took advantage and won the second elimination. Followed by Jimmy Thieme FRA and Ingmar Doldorf NED.

In the women’s fleet, Fabienne Hoogendam NED found her phase and won 2 races back to back and made sure to take a solid lead in this championship.

At 17:10 elimination three was started, but the wind was dropping so conditions got trickier and complicated. A Solid 13 to 15 knots were still enough to have fair racing conditions. With no big surprises, all the men favorites made it to the Final A. After an OCS in race 6 for women where Anna Biagiolini ITA, the winner of races 4 and 5, was too early to start.

The wind got too patchy and the race officer decided to end the day after an impressive total of 29 good starts. So Anna will now hope for more racing to discard her mistake or no more racing to stay in third place for the event.

The stand-out of the day was for sure unexpectedly Jakob Kooij NED who made it to final A in the first two races and showed some impressive abilities to currently stay in the 5th position after the first racing day.

Current Event leaders:

The forecast for day two is not so promising, but the hope is last to die and we will see what the weather will bring us. You can follow all the actions on the IFCA website where you will find life scoring and all media:


https://www.ifcaclass.com/2021-slalom-euros/
Or on IFCA Facebook page:


https://www.facebook.com/FunboardClass/
where you can already see the video of day one.

Stay tuned!