News Around the World
Above: however brave the face for Mat Belcher and Will Ryan the ecstasy of winning all three pre-Olympic regattas in Enoshima last autumn has turned into the agony of seeing a painstakingly planned-out Olympic programme stalled by a global tragedy that caught everyone (aside from one country) by surprise. After uncharacteristic stumbles on the approach to Rio 2016, then a disappointing for them silver medal, coming into Tokyo 2020 the five-time world champion crew were on fire, sailing flawlessly and still getting better. Tokyo 2021 will throw up some strange ones – the pressure of being a ‘deferred entry’ will play as big a part in the final results next year as it did at Los Angeles in 1984 when several obvious favourites from the boycotted Games of 1980 disappeared without trace
however, he was in a lot of pain, and it was difficult to balance competition with recovery. What was also frustrating was the pair knew they were otherwise in their best shape ever. Seahorse: So what happened next? Mat Belcher: The two European events, Palma and then Genoa, were some of the worst results we have had in a decade. What was difficult in terms of our strategy towards the Games was that we had adjusted the way we were doing some things, and so Palma was one of the venues where we were going to validate these different scenarios for Tokyo, and of course injury complicated all of that analysis. This impacted the confidence we would normally have in that validation process, and so to come away with two of our worst results, when we had decided to use those as specific performance indicators, was tricky. So the discussions after that of course had to include the
questions… are we on the right track here? What then came out of those discussions was the strength of ourselves as a team, and we absolutely believed we were on the right track, even if the results didn’t indicate that. To then come away with a win at the Europeans and then three great results in Japan highlighted the courage we had to continue with what we believed in. If not we would have completely redirected our equipment strategy, and for sure that is no small task… SH: It all just re-confirms that an Olympic journey is never straight- forward, however smooth it may look from the outside. MB: It was quite a difficult moment for us – our competitors would have noticed that something wasn’t right, and we knew it was a critical point in our programme. By August, heading to three key events in Japan, my collarbone had healed but it certainly took a lot longer than I thought… With three events at the Olympic venue in Japan, our strategy
was different from what you would expect for the Games or the worlds. Will and I had high expectations and we wanted to perform well at every event: the world championship, the pre-Olympics and the World Cup, three big events in a short period. Everyone wants
24 SEAHORSE
to win a world championship and pre-Olympics so it is a lot of hard competition, and different teams had of course different strategies. Some teams just wanted to peak for the worlds, and we saw the Spanish team of Jordi Xammar and Nicolás Rodriguez put on an amazing performance. Winning seven of the 11 races at a world championship is a massive effort, but then a week later they were 14 or 15 points behind us in the pre-Olympics, which is where we saw the Swedish team take on the charge. SH: But the Spanish pair made a big statement at the worlds… MB: That regatta was an interesting one for us, as we were on the back foot from day one while the Spanish were totally dominating, and it wasn’t something we were expecting. We had very similar conditions after day one, always planing conditions, and we know we are fast in that environment, and so we were happy with our preparation, but certainly other teams have considerably stepped up their game in those conditions. As the worlds progressed we just tried to stay in touch with the
Spanish, as every point was going to count right at the end. But while we stuck with business-as-usual we also sensed that they were pushing very hard, potentially sailing in a high-risk mindset. The challenge there is that once you start, at some stage a mistake will creep in – and Jordi mistimed the start in the medal race. We had a bit of a match race with them before that medal race,
but in those final minutes Will and I know we are really solid in our decision making. We had a sense that we were OCS, and so made the very early decision to go back and restart and the Spanish didn’t, and they got pulled from the race at the top mark. The balance always here is if you restart, are you going to be able to push to get to the front of the fleet again or not? So it’s all about what you are prepared to risk and/or give up here… There are two powerful take-outs from the worlds in Enoshima:
the Spanish securing seven out of 11 races, and Will and I being able to overcome that to win the event. But I think people now realise there are many teams capable of winning. SH: Then straight into the next…
PEDRO MARTINEZ
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