Paris 2024 Day 4: Five Things We Learned

Lucky or good? Maybe both

Either way, Noah Lyons (USA) picked up the best and possibly only bit of breeze on the first slalom start of the day in the Men’s Windsurfing and powered away to an easy victory while the rest of the fleet was parked up and struggling to get on the foils at start time.

Winning Wilson

Emma Wilson (GBR) is displaying extreme levels of competence in the Women’s Windsurfing, getting all her scores in the top two in a mix of slalom and course racing. Except for a 17th place in Race 5, just to remind us that she is mortal after all.

Coming round the mountain

The stunning Calanques mountain range played a big part in the racing for the skiff fleets today. Wind is lazy and always wants to find the path of least resistance and it certainly can’t blow straight through hard rock. So it swirls from one side to the other, trying to get past the 565m peak of Mont Puget. Many will be cursing that mountain this evening and the havoc it wreaked with their finishing scores. But somehow the Spanish skiff men and Kiwi skiff women made sense of the chaos to record some incredibly consistent results across three torrid and nerve-jangling races.

The hardest sailing was on the way back to the harbour

After winning the day on the race course, New Zealand’s Jo Aleh and Molly Meech discovered the waves on the way back into the harbour were “probably the worst waves I’ve ever sailed in,” according to Aleh. “But it was still good fun, a yeehaa moment, just that the waves were pretty heinous.”

Sometimes you have to remind yourself to enjoy the moment

James Peters and Fynn Sterritt (GBR) had a great day on the water, winning the last of three races and lifting themselves to fourth overall in the Men’s Skiff fleet. “It’s not relaxing out there at all, and pretty tiring with a lot to think about in those conditions,” said Peters, looking exhausted. “On the way in we both smiled at each other and thought this is what it’s all about. We’re in front of the cameras, sailing at our best and working as a team as well as we ever have, and winning a race like that at the Olympics, it’s an amazing feeling. I’m just really proud of us for doing that because there’s so much pressure and it’s so hard. So just to relax into it and allow ourselves to sail like that, it’s brilliant.”

written by Andy Rice