Sailing: Peter Burling and Blair Tuke put wind up their rivals

Peter Burling and Blair Tuke won the second race of the day and are now fifth overall in the 49er fleet. Photo / Sailing Energy

The wind came out to play at the Princess Sofia Regatta in Palma and, ominously for some of their rivals, it also signalled the emergence of Peter Burling and Blair Tuke into the top five of the 49er fleet.

The four-time world champions are sailing their first international 49er regatta since winning gold at the 2016 Rio Olympics and got off to a slow start. But they were seventh, first and third in yesterday's three races, the first in gold fleet racing for the 49ers, to jump eight places into fifth.

They still have some work to do to catch leaders Dylan Fletcher and Stuart Bithell from Great Britain with one more day of gold fleet racing before the top-10 medal race, but it has been an encouraging return to top-level Olympic class sailing.

They aren't the only Kiwis in contention in Palma. Andy Maloney continues to lead the Finn class, with Josh Junior third, Alex Maloney and Molly Meech are second in the 49erFX, Paul Snow-Hansen and Dan Willcox third in the men's 470 and Gemma Jones and Jason Saunders sixth in the Nacra 17.

There was always going to be a lot of interest in how Burling and Tuke fared in their return to international 49er sailing and they got off to an inauspicious start, hitting the mark in their first race on their way to 18th and backing it up with a 23rd. Since then, they have returned results all in the top 10, including two race wins.

One of those came yesterday in the strong and cold mistral wind that blew offshore from Palma in Spain. It proved challenging for many sailors, especially as wind speeds varied from 6 to 26 knots during the same race for the Laser and Nacra 17 classes.

"We had a good day out there for the first day of gold fleet racing," Tuke said. "Obviously we had a bit of ground to make up after qualifying but it was nice to get out there and put three low points on the board.

"We still have some catching up to do and we will have to sail really well if we want to get to the front but we are looking forward to going out there and executing some more good races. There's still plenty to play for."

It's the same in other classes, including the Finn. Maloney holds an 11-point lead over Giles Scott of Great Britain and Junior after banking a sixth and 14th in his two races yesterday but admitted it was challenging in the conditions.

"It was difficult to find a perfect pattern with the shifts and therefore quite hard to always get it right [yesterday]," Maloney said. "Josh and I both fought hard and it's really exciting to be in the hunt going into the final day of gold fleet racing."

Snow-Hansen and Willcox continued their climb up the men's 470 leaderboard into third on the back of a 12th and fifth in yesterday's two races. Swedes Anton Dahlberg and Fredrik Bergstrom have a handy 14-point lead over the British pair of Luke Patience and Chris Grube, with the Kiwis a further six points behind.

"We were a bit sticky in the first race but battled for every point around the course. Big snakes and ladders, so happy to come out with a keeper," Snow-Hansen said.

"Between races, we got the boat moving faster with the help of [coach] Andrew Brown and had a much easier race up the front end. From here, we just need to keep fighting for every point and sail cleanly."