After battling my way through the earlier rounds I finally made it to my first final of the event. As I am sailing to the start line I am watching the loser’s final, checking where everyone has started and who has the best position leading into the first gybe mark. I take a quick look at the starting line from the pin end to the boat and see if there is a favoured end to start from. I then head to the boat to get the warning signal and from that I go into auto pilot mode. All the equipment choices have already been made on the beach; I am using my 8.6m which is my go to sail in Turkey as I find we never race in wind that requires me to take a larger sail. I like to use a powerful fin because of the solid pressure it gives me when I am not in a leading position, the power also helps me get up and planing out of the marks quicker. Turkey’s course is quite tight so the extra lift under my feet helps again to fight around sailors in an overtaking situation. As the time ticks down in the first minute you find that most of the sailors will do the same routine in every start, even taking the same path to and from the boat to the first buoy during and under the 3 minute mark, there is rarely any pushing and fighting so early on and more a sense of calm before the storm. The first key moment comes at the 2 minute mark when we head back through the start line and head away from the course.