Murphy qualifies for the London Games

SAILING NEWS:ANNALISE MURPHY became the first Irish sailor to qualify for next summer's Olympic Games after she moved convincingly into the gold fleet of the Laser Radial event at the ISAF Sailing World Championships off Fremantle, Western Australia, yesterday.

Now lying in second place overall, she delivered her second race win so far.

The Dún Laoghaire single-hander had a consistent day with a second place and a fourth in medium-strength winds.

She lies second overall behind Evi Van Acker and level on points with defending world champion Marit Bouwmeester from the Netherlands.

All three shared the podium at the Sail for Gold regatta in June at the London 2012 Olympic venue in Weymouth when Murphy won bronze.

“I’m pretty happy with my results today so I can’t complain,” she said before the split into gold and silver fleets was made that led to her qualifying standard.

“I felt that I sailed well and didn’t make too many mistakes and the results show it,” she added

In the opening race of the day, Murphy rounded the first mark in around 10th place but quickly overtook the leading group on the downwind leg to pick-up second place.

Later on in the early afternoon, she won the second race with three minutes to spare as the breeze picked up to around 15 knots.

But while Murphy can now focus on a podium result for the remainder of this event that concludes with a top-10 medal race on Sunday, she was also cautious as the top sailors from the second flight of Laser Radials that makes up the 100-plus turnout in Perth contains plenty of top talent.

“There are about 20 girls that are all really good here. My prospects for the medal race are looking quite good but there are two more days of racing in the gold fleet,” she said.