Luis Martins and Nick Imprescia’s title hopes at the Key West World Championship in Florida have been dashed after picking up a costly penalty in the opening race.

The pair won the shortened race in their 32ft catamaran Nuff Said, but were hit with a severe lap penalty that dropped them down to fifteenth for colliding with a course buoy approaching turn one on the second lap.

“The world championship is too far for us to reach now and obviously the mood is all dampened by the mistake,” driver Martins told The Royal Gazette.

“We can probably get a win for the day, but we won’t win the worlds.”

Martins also feels a podium finish is beyond reach.

“They scored us with a lap penalty that put us to fifteenth because we hadn’t lapped anybody yet,” he said.

“Fifteenth is the points we get so even if you get first place tomorrow or Sunday it’s still not enough with the total points from Wednesday to get on the podium realistically.”

Martins added: “It will be very difficult to come back from that far down to get on the podium.

“We all thought it was a 30-second penalty, but it was a lap penalty so here we are.”

The race was red flagged after rivals Cameron Turk and Owen Bois flipped their boat on the fifth lap approaching the final turn on the backstretch.

Prior to their misfortune, Martins and throttle man Imprescia had been gunning for a second straight podium finish at the championship after finishing runner-up last year.

Also flying Bermuda’s flag in Key West this week is driver David Selley and throttle man Steven Bridges, who placed seventh in their boat Team Bermuda in the opening race.

More to follow