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Australia has surged ahead on the first day of its home Sail Grand Prix — but the host’s domination shared equal headline billing with Germany, who was hit with a historic penalty that could ruin its entire season.
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Germany was hit with a whopping penalty of 32 event points, and 12 season points, due to its involvement in three separate incidents during Friday’s practice.
The day set a record for penalties, with Germany’s tally the most penalty points ever given to a single team.
Footage shows Germany involved in one scary, close call with Brazil with the two teams only narrowly avoiding a disastrous crash.
“Whoa … what the f**k guys? Absolutely kidding me,” one of the Brazil crew members was heard saying on team radio.
Germany driver Erik Heil said, however, that the penalty was too hefty.
“It seems to be pretty harsh from our perspective,” Heil said.
“We’ve got two pretty clear situations yesterday and we took the pain for that.
“We think it’s just too much of a penalty for the whole season. Because you are actually taking people out of the game for the whole season.”
USA and Brazil also received penalties from the practice. Brazil was docked eight event points and four season ponints for the incident, while USA lost 12 event points, and eight season points after capsizing during a transit to practice.
Meanwhile, it was smooth sailing for Australia who won two of the four races, and hit a top speed of 96.3km/h.
“We are stoked with our day,’’ Australia’s Tom Slingsby said.
“It doesn’t get much better really. Four races in tough conditions and to come away with four good results, we are extremely happy.
“Getting the starts, that just set us up so well.
“I looked back around the bottom mark a few times and saw eight boats converging, some on port, some on starboard, and I just thought, I don’t know how they are all going to get around that mark. I was super glad I wasn’t back with them.’’
STANDINGS AFTER DAY 1 OF THE AUSTRALIA SAIL GRAND PRIX | SYDNEY:
Australia 37pts
Emirates Great Britain 32pts
France 27pts
Switzerland 26pts
ROCKWOOL Denmark 24pts
Spain 21pts
Canada 20pts
Red Bull Italy 8pts
New Zealand 7pts
Mubadala Brazil 0pts
Germany SailGP Team presented by Deutsche Bank -22pts
