Formula Kite, Two Big Wins for China

Local riders scored two big wins on home waters against top level international competition, on a thrilling final day at the Formula Kite Asia & Oceania Championships in Shenzhen, China.

Competing in light winds that sometimes dropped to as little as 6 knots, Jingyue Chen came through some difficult moments in the women's final to win the gold ahead of teammate Wan Li who took silver ahead of Julia Damasiewicz of Poland.

There were so many twists and turns in the men's final before Qibin Huang of China finally prevailed on countback ahead of Max Maeder, the reigning World Champion from Singapore who had to settle for silver, with Haoran Zhang of China taking bronze ahead of Croatia's Martin Dolenc.

PSYCHOLOGICAL BREAKTHROUGH

It was an important psychological victory for Huang to have beaten his friend and arch rival Maeder who so often comes out on top. "It's a total surprise and a complete honour to win on my home country," said Huang. "And finally to beat my old rival." The word 'old' being a relative term, considering that Huang and Maeder share the ripe old age of 17.

A BIG ONE IS BETTER THAN A SMALL ONE

Maeder has won almost everything on the international circuit this year, so it came as a bit of a surprise to see him beaten today. In the opening race of the final, Maeder, Huang and Zhang all made a late change from the biggest 23 square metre kite down to the 15 sqm. They were anticipating an increase in the breeze, but it never came. Dolenc didn't make the best of starts but his superior horsepower from sticking with the 23 sqm proved to be the correct choice. 

By the end of the first lap Dolenc had stretched to a comfortable lead. In the Medal Series format, the only thing that matters is winning races. The other three could see the race was pretty much done and so they sailed straight past the mark and back to the shore to do a rapid switch-up to their 23s lying on the sand.

Now that everyone was on the same size kite, Huang managed to win a race, which put him on equal wins with Maeder who had already got two wins on the board, his reward carried through from winning the qualifying series over the previous four days.

DRASTIC PLASTIC

When the four riders went out for the next race, Maeder hit a plastic bag which got wrapped around his foil. By the time he had extricated himself from the bag the race had begun and he was 30 seconds behind the action. This time Zhang narrowly beat Huang across the finish line, which kept the game open for a while longer.

Who would win the next? Unfortunately the breeze had started to disappear and we never got to see it play out on the water. Huang's bullet earlier in the afternoon gave him victory on a tiebreak with Maeder, who was gracious in defeat. "I have no complaints," he said. "OK, the plastic bag was unlucky but Qibin beat me fair and square. That's racing and he deserves it."

In the women's final Wan Li took the first race after coming from third place up to first at the final windward mark having hooked into a big right-hand windshift before the two riders ahead of her, Chen and Damasiewicz. But no mistakes from Chen in the next race, the yellow bib wearer securing the race win she needed to seal overall victory.

LAURIANE JETTING IN FOR WORLD SERIES FINAL

This evening the medallists celebrated their success at the closing ceremony. Now the fleet moves four hours along the Chinese coast to get ready for KiteFoil World Series China in Zhuhai, starting on Wednesday. A few more riders will be joining for the competition, not least this year's dominant female rider, Lauriane Nolot from France who leads the women's rankings and will be keen to win her share of the 50,000 Euros prize money in Zhuhai.