Thailand’s Olympians proved unbeatable once again at the 2018 Thailand Laser National Championships, with top Thai and Malaysian sailors doing serious battle in the Laser Standard and women putting the men to shame in the Laser Radial and Laser 4.7 classes
It was a record turnout with 58 entries for the Championships, held over the weekend of the 24th and 25th February at Royal Varuna Yacht Club in Pattaya. The wind was not completely co-operative, but it did fill in well and give all the competitors some challenging racing.
With the wind shifts, the race committee was busy all day, changing the course sometimes on an hourly basis, but they managed to get 7 good races in to give all the sailors some great racing over the weekend.
In the 4.7 class, it was very competitive at the top with 6 different race winners. All was in doubt until the final two races, with Sophia Montgomery, Paliga Poonpat, and Chanokchon Wangsuk all in contention, but Initra Pampiboon sailed a great two final races, winning both to finish with equal points to Sophia. On count-back it was Initra with the most first places who took the top spot on the podium, with Sophia in second and Paliga just beating Chanokchon on another count-back.
The Radial class saw the welcome return of Rio 2016 Olympian Kamolwan Chanyim to the racing scene. She made no mistakes the entire weekend to finish with a perfect set of results – seven firsts out of seven races! Behind her was her good friend Vanicha Chomtongdee who did a great job of keeping Kamolwan honest, with one of Malaysia’s top female sailors, Khairunneeta Mohd Afendy, finishing third.
It was down to the Standard class to break the domination of the women after female sailors filled all top three podium positions in both the 4.7 and Radial classes. With a very competitive fleet, the top five positions were contested down to the last race. The top four all won at least one race, and it was a matter of not just doing well but being consistent, most having at least one bad score. At the end of the day it was two time Thai Olympian Keerati Bualong at the top, never finishing below fourth, with rising talent Chusitt Punjamala just managing to beat two time Malaysian Olympian Khairulnizam Mohd Afendy for second and with Malaysia’s Asri Azman just behind in fourth.
The weekend was not just about the top places. There were lots of contests for the age group winners throughout the fleet. Overall it was a great weekend for sailing, with competitors from 11 years old to 81 years old competing, which is what sailing should be about. There was tough competition on the water (and a couple of protests!), but what made the event so good was the smiles on everyone’s faces at the prize giving to make it one of the best Laser Nationals in recent memory.
