M32-Catamaran - World Match Racing Tour 2016 - Freemantle AUS - Day 1

The 2016 World Match Race Tour, for the first time on the M32-catamarans and a new format, began this morning in Freemantle, Westaustralien. The 20 teams, split in four groups start with two fleetraces to define the matchrace seeding. The top teams of the past season received 2016 Tour Card, such as the World Champion Ian Williams GBR, or Taylor Canfield ISV. Eric Monnin SUI, after a successful WMRT 2015 season, will endeavour to benefit from his Décision-35 catamaran experience to keep the level. In addtion, a number of Scandinavian teams participate, as the M32 are built in Sweden and quite a class activity emerged already.
This morning UTC, two of the four Groups have been sailing already. Ian Williams GBR and his team won all three heats in Group A. Taylor Canfield ISV and Matthias Rahm SWE share the lead of Group B after 3 races. Eric Monnin SUI will be sailing in Group D with the Freemantle local and GC32-experienced Keith Swinton AUS, as well as Niklas Dackhammar SWE with vast M32 experience as main opponents. The results of Group C and D will be posted during the morning UTC on the event website. The livestream transmission from Freemantle will start on this website at 6h UTC.