By james art Updated: October 30, 2024, 8:05 p.m
Kelsey Durham, far boat, in action on day two of the Bermuda Gold Cup (photo by Ian Roman)
Kelsey Durham was agonizingly close to pulling off a major upset on day two of the Bermuda Gold Cup in Hamilton Harbor on Wednesday.
The Bermuda coxedman led four-time regatta winner and defending champion Jonny Berntsson in the final run to the finish line, but just couldn’t hold off his Swedish rival.
“We fought every race and we just lost right at the end,” Durham said The Royal Gazette.
“It’s just our lack of competition for games the last four years that we haven’t done while these guys do it all the time.”
Durham took an early advantage after Berntsson was booked for a double penalty, fighting for the preferred end of the line before kick-off.
The lead then changed hands before the defending champion surged ahead in the windy final stage. Durham continued to fight but was stopped dead after losing his spinnaker while trying to set the finish line.
The local sailor felt he should have received two additional penalties after Berntsson appeared to have made contact with his boat short of the finish.
“We got two more penalties on Johnny and the jury said we never raised a flag, so that’s why they didn’t make the call,” Durham said.
“But my tactician raised the flag and they didn’t see it. His [Berntsson] the spinnaker hit my backstall and my bow hit its stern in the wind to the finish and I was on the straight both times. It was right at the end and he should have taken a penalty right there.”
Kelsey Durham (Photo by Colin Thompson)
Durham was forced to make a crew change in the final race of the day after trimmer Nico Stefani was injured in the spinnaker mishap against Berntsson.
“Nico had the spinnaker cover wrapped around his leg when it went into the water and it pulled his leg into the winch,” Durham said.
“He’s lucky he didn’t break it, but he got a big bruise and the nurse wouldn’t let him sail again, so we had to bring in Joshua Greenslade.”
Durham, who had one win in the round robin stage of the regatta, are now hoping for better luck heading into the quarter finals.
“Now everyone can see that our match competitions are back and we’re improving the tactical part,” he said.
“We’re fast and going up against Jonny Berntsson and Eric Monin shows we’re a force to be reckoned with, so we’ll see who we’re paired with tomorrow and go from there.”
Berntsson topped the rankings after the match and is full of confidence heading into the quarterfinals.
“It was a good race today,” he said. “We had strong winds at the start of the race and then they died down a bit so I think we’re getting into most of the conditions we can have.
“We haven’t really had light wind conditions, but I think that will come later in the week. It’s a good warm-up to have the match and be in a good position outside of it, so I’m looking forward to the quarter-finals.”
Berntsson also praised Durham after their close battle late in the afternoon.
“He’s done a really good job and we love the guy, he’s a really good guy,” he said.
“I know he really wanted to win against us. We started with a double penalty before the start so we had to take it from there. First we got one out and then we got back into the race and had to see how we could trick him and at the top we got rid of our second penalty and came out right behind him.
Then we overtook him and had the advantage on the right in front of him and that was good for us.”