Haddad & Bethlem win 470 Men's Olympic selection for Brazil

Henrique Haddad and Bruno Bethlem will represent their country at the postponed Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games next year after securing qualification in the Brazilian trials event.

It will be the second Olympic Games for the duo, who finished 23rd at Rio 2016.

They fended off seven other teams to win the Brazilian Class 470 Men’s Selective in Ilhabela, which drew to an exciting close on Saturday 17 October.

Also present were Geison Mendes Dzioubanov and Gustavo Thiesen, who won the country qualification slot at the South American Sailing Championships back in February but are now sailing with different partners; Mendes with Tiago L Quevedo, and Thiesen with Fabio Pillar.

Three races were scheduled on the final day of the event in an easterly wind, ranging from 10-16 knots.

It went right down to the wire and the final race proved to be decisive as three crews had a mathematical change of winning.

Haddad & Bethlem were tied on 17 points with Ricardo C Paranhos & Rodolfo B Streibel, while Pillar & Thiesen stood only one point behind with 18 points.

Paranhos & Streibel started the race at the pin end, making a first beat to the left of the race course, while Haddad & Bethlem began close to the starting boat. The wind prevailed on the right, and Haddad & Bethlem rounded the first mark in second place behind Pillar & Thiesen. Paranhos & Streibel only passed in fourth place and well behind.

As the race progressed, Haddad & Bethlem passed Pillar & Thiesen in the last downwind to win the race and the championship. In the end, Henrique and Bruno managed to pass Fabio and Gustavo in the last downwind to win both the race and the championship. Paranhos & Streibel managed to recover and beat Pillar & Thiesen to second place.

The Class 470 Men’s Selective was organised by the Brazilian Sailing Confederation (CBVela) and the City of Ilhabela with Bradesco as sponsor.