Medal race, Sail for Gold

Hello all, well sadly Peter and I ended the Sail for Gold on a very gutting note.

We felt we had a great plan and were feeling great before the start of the medal race today. We felt comfortable with the race area and Harvey our coach and the Met team had done a great job of preparing us.

We needed a result in the top 4 in our minds to secure a medal.

We had a great start at the comittee boat end and were nicely in control off the start line. The wind was left so we quickly flicked onto Port to go with the fleet. The wind started to shift back to the right so we tacked back ready for the final wind shift into the windward mark. Sadly it never came, the wind just kept going right. We also sailed over a big clump of weed. This just confounded our problems aas we were now the wrong side of the shift and going very slowly.

We were still in the race but we just couldn't seem to do anything right. By the time we had realised how bigger problem the weed was for us the race had gone and we were firmly last.

This puts us 5th overall. Which isn't terrible. We acheived our goal at the event as well, it just would have been nice to have come away with a medal.

We are really gutted but are both excited about getting on with improving our weak areas. We are struggling for boatspeed which is making it hard for us. It is like racing in Formula 1 and driving a slow car. It just makes it so much harder.

We are looking forward to having a bit of a break and then getting into some really good winter training when I am sure we will make a huge leap forwards even more. We have had a pretty good season, 2nd in Palma, 4th in Kiel, 1st Europeans and 5th here. We are geting towards the top but there is still plenty of work for us to do, and work we will !!!!

Thanks so much to all the people who give us so much support, all the best and we look forward to keeping you up to speed with how things progress.

All the best

Chris and Peter

Sail for Gold, Day 5

Hello all,

Today was a pretty big day for us on the water. We really needed to keep moving up the results to achieve the goal we had set ourselves of being in a a chance of a medal going into the medal race.

The conditions were tricky Northerly wind fighting against an establishing sea breeze. It was really tricky to call what was going to be the most important factor going into each race and I can safely say that my Brain is very tired.

We started the day with a really bad first upwind leg and rounded the first windward mark well back in the fleet. We sailed a really nice downwind leg though and caught up to finish 4th. Some of the best sailing we have done this week.

The next race we had a great start and first beat and looked to be in great shape. We rounded the windward mark in 5th. Sadly though up the next beat we missed a couple of features and let a couple of boats through. A couple more snuck past us at the end of the race so we finished 11th. It was pretty annoying to say the least but we did a good job of putting it to the back of our minds quickly to get focussed on the next race.

Race three, now the wind was getting really funky. We were seeing a huge range in the direction that the wind was coming from meaning that wherever you were on the course, nothing was certain. However we managed to sail a good safe race to finish in 5th.

While 4,11,5 doesn't sound that great, across the fleet it was a good day and we are now two points off Silver and egual for Bronze going into the medal race. Gold is a little way off but mathematically catchable. It is on !

We're really excited about the race tomorrow. It hasn't been the greatest event for us but we have still managed to wrestle back into contention. We will be leaping out of our sacks in the morning !

All the best

Chris and Peter

Sail for gold , Gold Fleet

Hello all,

Today was the first day of the finals. After two days of qualification when the fleet is split into two equal groups according to ranking the top 25 only race one another. All of the points carry forwards from the qualification but the finals is where the regatta really tightens up.

Before the racing today there was plenty of wind and it was looking like the racing was going to be really full on. Just before the start the wind dropped loads and the whole fleet were madly changing they're settings on the rigs when the 5 minute warning flag went up.

We sailed a fairly good race, we didn't have a great start but we sailed a nice first leg and the rest of the race to get a 7th. The next race was a little better, after a smarter start we sailed round in 6th for most of the race which was where we finished. The third and final race we had a great start and and sailed a good race to finish in 4th.

So overall it was a much better day. We still made a few silly mistakes today and we know what to do tomorrow to iron those out. So we're looking forward to getting out there and putting together a nice set of races tomorrow.

We look forward to telling you more then, all the best

Chris and Peter

Sail for gold day three

Well,

day three at the sail for gold was not so sweet for us. Yesterday there was no racing for our group which was a bit of a shame so we were raring to go today with 4 races scheduled.

We had nice conditions with 9-15 knots of breeze and a nice bit of currant bun. Sadly lady luck was not really giving us much and we struggled to do the simple things right today which is always such a back bone of our racing. We scored something like 12,9,13,4. The last race which was the fourth we finally started to sail a bit better and it was nice to finish the day on a positive note.

I would be lying if I didn't say we are pissed off with our day today ! We did learn some good stuff and tomorrow will be better. We are very much looking forward to getting out there and getting back into it. We're still in touch with the leaders and it is Gold fleet tomorrow ( when only the top 25 race each other )

We look forward to getting back to you with better news.

All the best

Chris and Peter

Sail for Gold Day One

Hello all,

Well today was a little different to the last few weeks, the wind was moving a lot and there was a big range in strength. This made for lots of place changing and some really exciting races. The tide was pushing everyone over the start line all day as well which made for tricky starting. Lots of boats were caught out by this and picked up OCS's ( over the start line early )

We tried hard to stick to our plan, to sail safe and low risk. We had three solid races of 2, 5, 3 so we're pleased with our first day.

We're looking forward to another great day racing tomorrow, hopefully Weymouth can continue to put on a good show and give us more good conditions for racing.

Thanks everyone for all the support.

All the best

Chris and Peter

Sail for Gold practice day

Hello all,

Our apologies for not keeping everyone more up to speed over the last few weeks.

Since the European Championships it's been busy busy. We've been based in Weymouth getting revved up for the Sail for Gold regatta. We spent two weeks racing on the olympic course areas with the rest of the British 49er squad which proved very useful. It enabled us to work on the things we felt needed improving post Euros and gain some more knowledge about the course areas.

The last week has been spent living in the 'Olympic Bubble'. We have been living and operating with the whole of Skandia Team GBR with a goal of simulating the Olympic regatta itself. It has been great to be part of the team and Peter and I have taken lots from the build up over the last week.

So, the Sail for Gold regatta starts tomorrow. The kit is all ready and we are raring to go. The forecast looks like we are going to have a great mixed bag of conditions and we can't wait to get going.

Thanks to everyone for your support, we look forward to keeping you up to date with the racing

All the best Chris and Peter

Europeans Final Day

Hello all, well we are really pleased to say that we are The European champions.

Today was a hard day, we had one race left of normal racing with the Gold fleet. We had a reasonable result as our discard so we were fairly comfortable for the medal race whatever the outcome of the race. However it would have been nice to have had a good race and we foolishly attacked the race a bit too much. A high risk start meant we were committed to one side of the course which turned out to be the wrong one. We maed a few places back but with little passing opportunities it was hard to make in-roads back in to the fleet. So we counted our discard.

Sadly for us, Stevie and Ben, the Austrians and the French had all had good last races. Suddenly it was all on in the medal race. There was quite a possibility we could walk away from a good weeks sailing with nothing.

The medal race was really close to the shore. There was lots of confused water but a nice 10-12 knots. The first windward mark was the critical part of the race, we just managed to sneak around the first mark in fourth, ahead of Stevie and Ben and in a good position overall. We chipped away at the next boat in front of us and managed to hold a comfortable position in third for the rest of the race. This meant we had done enough overall to win the Championship.

It goes without saying that we are really really pleased. We've sailed together now for fourteen months and the hard work we have put in since we started full-time in November has started to pay off. It's now really important that we take the lessons we have learnt from this event forwards and makesure we don't lose sight of what has made such a good series for us.

Thanks so much to all our support network, our amazing families and parents, Harv our coach and all our sponsors for helping to prepare us in the best way possible.

All the best

Chris and Peter