Sport

Patches' rally is too late as Palma crown slips away

SAILING: A much-improved performance in the second half of the Copa del Rey regatta in Palma was too late to aid Eamon Conneely…

David Branigan in Palma de Mallorca
Mon Aug 06 2007 - 01:00

SAILING:A much-improved performance in the second half of the Copa del Rey regatta in Palma was too late to aid Eamon Conneely's Patches' defence of their 2006 victory when Paul Cayard on Siemens romped home to collect the trophy at the weekend.

The final day of racing was filled with twists but for the Galway boat, a three-day run of being the top scoring boat in the fleet was insufficient to repair the damage inflicted to their score from the opening two days.

In the end, Conneely's team placed fourth to maintain their fifth place in the Breitling MedCup circuit standings.

Both the owner and skipper Ian Walker admitted their lack of race wins was frustrating.

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As with the previous event at neighbouring Portals, the Irish boat received a boost in the final standings when two other boats fell foul of the rules.

In the penultimate race of the Cope del Rey on Saturday, King Juan Carlos' Bribon apparently won the race to the delight of a fleet of 100 spectator boats. But the race committee ruled that Bribon had crossed the starting line early and though an individual recall signal was made, failed to return and start again. Bribon later protested that only one boat, the Portuguese entry Bigamisto, was identified on the subsequent VHF radio call but the international jury upheld the race committee's decision.

In an apparent inconsistency, the jury ruled in favour of a redress application for Mutua Madrilena when the race committee signalled a general recall for the start of a race on Wednesday but then changed to an individual recall for the Spanish boat and Patches.

Mutua secured an improvement of four extra places from the jury for the committee's error.

Patches couldn't see the flag error so didn't request similar redress, which could ultimately have resulted in a podium result.

British-entry Stay Calm, having improved steadily during this regatta and winner of both races on Friday, failed to take a penalty on the water after an incident with German-entry Platoon in the final race and was later disqualified from the race, boosting most of the fleet up one place in the final standings.