Stunner
At the end of the Olympic Regatta the national team leaders met the race com- mittee and organisers and gave them a standing ovation. According to principal race officer for the Games Tom Duggan, that never happens. Team leaders are there to bring their problems, not to heap praise. But such was the feeling of a regatta well run that they could only stand and applaud an event that went off without any major hitches… and in the most trying of wider circumstances. Yes, it would have been great to see more
of the big waves experienced in previous years while training and competing at Enoshima, although whether the Nacra 17s and skiff fleets would have coped with monster waves is another question that never needed answering; but that is not really within the control of regatta organisers. Nevertheless, only one day was lost due
58 SEAHORSE
to lack of wind, fortunately the day before IOC president Thomas Bach swung into Enoshima to make his papal visit. The loss of racing on Monday resulted in ‘Four Medal Race Day’, which was an incredible four hours of drama. Bach met Dylan Fletcher and Stu Bithell
soon after they beat class icons Pete Burl- ing and Blair Tuke to the 49er gold medal by little more than a second. He witnessed a thrilling finale in the Finn, another British gold medal claimed by Giles Scott, this one with less than two seconds’ margin. In terms of sailing attempting to justify its future status in the Games to the IOC, things couldn’t have gone better. Which is just as well, because it’s hard to
recall a Games that has brought in so many new and ‘unOlympic’ sports like skate- boarding and BMX freestyle as well as speed climbing and surfing. Every sport is resistant to change, not just sailing. But the modern Olympics is not about tradition, it’s now an unashamedly made-for-TV product and every sport has to justify its ongoing existence on those terms. Visually some of the current events just don’t cut it. In terms of sporting drama, however,
rather than a TV show, nearly every one of the 10 sailing events had something to offer. RS:X Men’s Windsurfing Kiran Badloe
(NED) won gold with a race to spare but the Medal Race was a nail-biting catalogue of disasters for the main contenders for the other medals. Mattia Camboni (ITA), Piotr Myszka (POL) and Thomas Goyard
(FRA) were all pulled out of the race for starting too early. Goyard was distraught but somehow held on for silver despite having to sit out the race. The TV cameras caught the falling and rising emotions beautifully. Something for viewers at least. RS:X Women’s Windsurfing Great to
witness a three-way battle for the medals, with Yunxiu Lu (CHN) taking gold ahead of Charline Picon (FRA) who took silver, Emma Wilson (GBR) taking bronze. As a spectacle, though, pretty horrible to watch with athletes working like crazy to pump their boards along in virtually no wind. No wonder the windsurfers can’t wait to ditch their old-school RS:X low-rider boards for the IQ Foil coming in for Paris 2024. Laser Men Another Medal Race where
the gold medal had already gone to Matt Wearn after a staggering comeback follow- ing a stuttering start to the regatta for the humble Australian. These pre-won Medal Races really aren’t very good from a story- telling perspective but again there was plenty of minor-medal drama with Tonci Stipanovic (CRO) somehow scrambling his way to another silver medal to match the one he won in Rio five years earlier. The Croatian really rises to the big occasion, and it was wonderful to see how much Stipanovic surprised even himself with such a standout performance. Laser and Laser Radial These were the
toughest of all the Olympic sailing events. So much depth, so hard to maintain a consistent series. Putting aside my British
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