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London 2012 I was fully back on it and pretty much won every event. SH: How would you describe Michael Blackburn’s coaching style? TS: Blackers was still fairly new to coaching, and obviously we had just had our Olympic trials and so 2008 was an interesting process for both of us. He was the reason I got into Olympic sailing as he was my idol in 2000 in Sydney, I was watching and cheering for him to beat Robert Scheidt and Ben Ainslie in the Laser. And in 2004 it was our first Olympic trials against each other which he won fairly convincingly; now he was both idol and rival. Then between 2004 and 2008 we became pretty serious rivals, with plenty of ups and downs where we plain hated each other. But then we figured out that just wasn’t true, we just hated the
situation, where two people ranked 1 and 2 in the world are going for one spot. And so after one seriously feisty session out on the water – where we were blowing up at each other and breaking rules to get in each other’s faces – we came in, sat down and had the big chat; almost immediately we realised the smart move was to do it the right way and make each other the best sailor possible, because there was a lot we could both learn.
TS: That is exactly the word I always use to describe that campaign. He sat me down one day and said, ‘Tom, you have more talent than anyone but you have weaknesses. In fully stretched hiking conditions you win every race. But when you are training you only want to train in hiking conditions. You smoke everyone and you could train for three years in a breeze and still not win gold – we need to start train- ing in the stuff you hate, the light air downwind, working on finesse in light air, or choppy upwind or in a swell. So let’s go...’ So we went through all of my weaknesses and turned them into
strengths, basically finding the bottom rung of my ladder and putting it on top. His structure and professionalism helped me enormously. SH: What about the boat and equipment… TS: Going back to my 2008 Olympics, my [supplied] boat was less than ideal. I certainly don’t blame my result on the boat, but it leaked up through the centreboard case, plus had a couple of other issues. So in the lead-up to 2012 we would go and measure up 10 boats,
find the worst one with the wrong mast rake and the heaviest hull and Blackers would say, ‘Here is your boat.’ Mate, at first I really hated it. I was getting smoked in training but all this was about col- lecting data and turning it into a playbook. A fascinating exercise but very time-consuming of course. ‘So for a Laser of this weight with these characteristics, you just don’t have a low-mode upwind or you have to sail the boat high and slow. Plus if we get this type of Laser you have to be more patient downwind as it is heavier and you can’t just zip around the track looking for every wave.’ So when we arrived at the Olympics to get the supplied equipment
Tom Slingsby – looking more relieved than happy – gives coach Michael Blackburn some love having won Laser gold at London 2012. Compare this image with last month’s shot of the likeable Australian desperate to move on from his awful Olympic debut in China in 2008 when he started as favourite and finished 22nd
From then on those Olympic trials were amazing… We were 1
and 2 in every Olympic selection regatta we did, going head to head I think 4-4 including worlds and Europeans. And so it came down to a panel vote. Right after the vote Michael was given the news that I had been selected, and he asked the panel if he could be the one who informed me. So Blackers called me and told me I was going to the Olympics, and how proud of me he was… It was an amazing call that I remember to this day. From that he became my coach after Beijing, so idol, rival, coach and now a very close friend. SH:His background is as a medical practitioner, so he understands the body and particularly biomechanics… TS: Yep, he studied psychology, nutrition, human movement and biomechanics… a clever guy. Lucky for me, it turned out! SH: Leading up to London, how did he keep things fresh and fun? TS: Oh, Blackers has a very good sense of humour! People think of him as an introvert, but he is exceptionally good with the people he is close to. He prefers smaller groups but he can be very funny. Don’t forget he had just started coaching back then so it was
all pretty new. There were some communication issues right at the beginning, but we just worked through them. For instance, if I came off the water and asked him what I was doing wrong, and what do I need to do better, he was never going to give me a quick answer that was a silver bullet. He wanted to head in, review the footage, analyse things, debrief and get the right answer. Not just deliver an answer because I was pushing him hard for one. SH: That is a very methodical approach.
32 SEAHORSE
I didn’t have a good rake number and the hull was a bit heavy, but we went through all our notes and we found a boat that I had trained on with very similar numbers, where I was slow at first but after a good amount of work we turned it around. And so we reviewed our data knowing what we had to do and I was able to adapt my sailing style to suit that type of Laser in Weymouth. SH: How does Michael Blackburn deal with setbacks? TS: Blackers is just really good at it; he doesn’t get emotional, and I of course do, and so he looks at the problem in a different way. Straight away he is analysing the situation; I would come off the water and say, ‘I can’t believe I lost that race.’ Viewing it from an emotional perspective, but Blackers would say, ‘OK, we didn’t get the result we wanted. Why was that? ‘You lost a race sailed in 12-14kt, you lost to someone you
normally beat four times out of five, this time he was fast downwind in that chop.’ He was rapidly analysing where that loss occurred and what we needed to work on next week. By contrast I would have sat there saying, ‘I have just lost, I am not as good as the guy who has just won and I need to figure out how to get better…’ As I said, Blackers is extremely methodical. I think emotion for
the athlete is great – it gives you passion, fire and drive – but for the coach it is less good and needs to be scaled right back. Blackers was of course a phenomenal sailor as well, multiple world titles and Olympics, but I think he is even better as a coach. SH:Weymouth 2012, you’re in good shape and have done the work. TS: In the lead-up to 2012 I was getting a bit of a hammering in the press, saying that I was the favourite again and so why is it going to be any different this time? And I remember a saying I came up with in 2010 that I lived by: ‘If I do what I know I can do, no one can beat me. My best will beat anyone else’s best.’ Blackers enforced that thought process within me, saying, ‘Tom,
if you are on form it doesn’t matter what Paul Goodison, or Rasmus Myrgren, or Andrew Murdoch does, their best will never beat your best. Basically you are not in a battle with these other sailors, you are in a battle with yourself to perform at the level we both know you are capable of. If you do that they are not rivals any more.’ So we sort of de-humanised the racing. I stopped looking for Paul
Goodison or Andrew Murdoch on the racetrack, I started looking at everyone as the same, with the understanding that I am not racing them – I am racing myself. Even so, heading into London 2012 I was battling a few demons, for sure. I have been in this situation before, how do I not make this all fall apart again? But on the first day fortunately it was breezy and wavy conditions, just bread and
ALAMY
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