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Off the ropes

The Olympics sucks. I think I can safely say that now, having had a month to recover from the kick in the guts that is getting to within touching distance of your dream and then making a mess of the last step to grab hold of it. It has felt almost childish at times to take so long to get over what are in theory the games, but when you work so hard seeing it as a game becomes harder. However since being back from China we have been round several welcome home parties and had to stand in the back of many pictures. (at which, we are now very good at smiling with a distant look in our eyes!) Finally we seem to be at the other end and begin to look forward rather than back which is of course the only thing that we can do now.

In the middle of September we took part in the ‘Skandia Sail for Gold’ regatta in Weymouth (which apparently where the racing will be in 2012, this was only mentioned a few times though!), I think it would be fair to say that sailing was the last thing we wanted to do however when needs must and all. We said before that we wanted to make the event fun and enjoy our sailing. This has always been our strength really the 2 guys with the biggest smiles that seem to just be loving it. However this year the fun has gone a little a we lost a bit of control of doing things our way, one of the many things we shouldn’t have done in ‘hindsight!” (I hate that word with a passion!). Portland harbour produced a great week always hard down on the trapeze and the boat really ripping, which is what I so love about 49’er sailing. We sailed I would have said, the most naturally we have sailed since the worlds in Australia last winter and really did have a good time. (Always is more fun when you win they say) This was honestly due to the fact that we relaxed and didn’t think about the results.

I think the best thing to come from the whole experience is the knowledge that even in the most testing of situations ‘we’ stayed ‘we’! Our biggest strength is our team and the way we enjoy the journey. This year we thought it might be better to try other ways of getting there which may have been better. In truth our route however unconventional (even with the mountain passes!)(private joke) generally gets us where we want to be when we need to be there and we now have more faith in this than ever.
The facts of the here and now are we didn’t sail too well for a 5 day event in the August 2008 and we are going to let nothing get in our way of sailing the best we can in Weymouth (apparently the venue for the next Olympics?!) in 2012. It’s a lot of work for 5 days sailing but the journey to get there is truly one of the best experiences you can ever hope to have.

I would like to thank everybody who has been sending us their thanks and good wishes. Apologise for not being very good at receiving them but your support is very well received. I hope we will keep the website up to date as much as possible though we are having a bit of time away from the boat at the moment.

When we are back the 49er will look very different, bigger mast, main and jib. (did the designer see the medal race?) Wow going to be fun learning to sail that puppy. Oh yeah and Ben’s now the proud dad of a dog called ‘Baxter’ so all say ahhhhh!

All over

As those of you who've been following our progress will have seen the event is over and finished in serious controversy.
The medal race was run in extreme conditions. Breeze up to 22kts and a large sea running along with a reduced fleet weight made for an exciting race. The medals swapped hands a number of times on every lap! Every boat on the course capsized at least once with most twice or more! For us with no pressure it was great fun and we very nearly won, pitch poling within 100 yrds of the finish (There's some great pics on the Internet). The Danish who were leading going into the race snapped a mast pre-race but managed to borrow a boat off the Croatians and get back to start 3 mins 56 behind the fleet! They sailed round without the spinnaker and finished 7th winning the Gold by a couple of points from Medal race winners the Spanish. As you can imagine the jury room was a busy place when we got in with numerous protests as to the suitability of the conditions and whether the Danes result should stand given the fact they used a different boat. The protests carried on late into the night and resumed in the morning. We came back down to find out the final result. And it finished as it stood with the Danes in Gold the Spanish 2nd and the Germans 3rd. I'm sure there will be a lot of talk as to whether the decision was right but I personally feel it was a good decision for the sport. The fact that the Danes did everything possible and the act of sportsmanship by the Croatians is something the class should be proud of.

For us the chance of a medal slipped away the day before. Its hard to put into words how it feels to have worked for so long and have it slip from our grasp. I'm finding it hard to know how to feel. Just so frustrated and down. I guess you put on a smiley face and say its just motivated us more for 2012. I've certainly learnt more about myself these last few days then in a long time.
Looking back its easy to see where we've made mistakes in the build up this last year and it seems the only way to have realised the problems is by having experienced this. People say its a great thing to have experienced an Olympic Games but to tell you the truth its been one of the worst weeks of my life and bar the adrenalin of the Medal race its felt horrible, mentally trying to stay on top all week. All I really want to do is go home but we're out here for another few days packing up before heading to Beijing for the Closing Ceremony.

We've been on the seawall cheering on the remaining classes in the medal races. The team has done phenomenally well. And a lot of credit has to go the the support staff that go through the same stress as us without the action. Its been great seeing most of the team realise their deserved goals.
Massive sympathy for Nick, I can only imagine what it feels like to have come so close, and of all the people who you'd hope it'd never happen to it would be Nick.

Thanks to everyone who has supported us this last year and special thanks to my parents, brother and girlfriend who travelled out here. I sorry we couldn't make it a more enjoyable experience.

After a rest day keeping out of the sun we started race 7 confident that we were on top of the issues of the other day. Unfortunately we misjudged the start line on account that we felt the pin end of the line was drifting. We protested on return to shore, requesting redress but it was denied due to lack of proof. So another terrible result to add to the score sheet. Pretty gutted!

Anyway we managed to follow it up with our best two results of the event a 3rd, then a 2nd. This leaves us 8th overall. A lot further back than we'd have hoped but on the positive side around the same position as we were in last year and we managed to turn it around then.

Yesterday, although scheduled 3 races we never left the shore due to the wind never blowing more than 2kts. Which leaves us today with another 3 and the probability we'll lose the rest day tomorrow to do the missing 3. At the moment we are waiting for the wind to settle enough to lay a course in as its offshore.
Just crossing fingers we can complete the series.

And we promise we haven't given up and we are still enjoying the Olympic experience!!!

Second day

After our great first day, the second days racing was the kind of day we'd been hoping wouldn't happen. The breeze was good and there was a large sea running from just about every direction. We had good starts but during the first race the mainsheet got caught around the camera tripod on the back of the boat and snapped one of the bridles. We were able to keep racing but its hard to know how much it cost us especially as it was a boat speed type of course. The race officer was turning the races over so fast that by the time we'd fixed the mainsheet the next race's sequence had begun. We got another good start but seemed to lack the pace to take advantage of some of the opportunites that came our way. On reaching the finish we lifted the centerboard to find in covered in tar! Not very helpful. By the third race we still had no definate answers to what was going wrong thanks to the mainsheet and the tar and so maybe lacked the confidence in our decision making that is usually so good. Anyway we had another poor result.
A pretty depressing day. Its dropped us to 9th overall but on the plus side there's still potentially 10 races left so plenty of time to catch up. Just got to cross fingers we have a better run of things and that the wind keeps blowing!

Opening Ceremony, problems and first days racing

For most of the sailing team with ourselves included, didn't have the time to fly to Beijing and back for the Opening Ceremony. It required leaving on the morning of the 8th and not returning till midday on the 9th. With our racing starting on 10th there just wasn't enough time.
Instead the team put on a dinner with a live BBC feed so we could watch. The whole team dressed up in team uniform and there was a great atmosphere with everyone cheering every time a Brit came into shot!

The 9th we'd planned to have as a rest day but with a few jobs left to do on the boat we went down early to sort them. Unfortunately whilst doing this we discovered a slight void in the bow where the gel coat had sunk and so needed repairing. Fortunately we have a boat builder out here to help but after filling and sanding it back he discovered more holes. In the end we spent the whole day down at the boat park. Not quite what we'd had in mind for a day off.
After spending so much time in the sun and with racing starting the next day we gave the local opening ceremony a miss and chilled out in the hotel watching it on TV.

First day of racing for us yesterday. Both pretty nervous. We had three races with the first two run in around 6 kts but the last a bit touch and go when the wind dropped to 2kts on the first beat. We managed to stay on top of the nerves and finished the day with a 3,4,5 scoreline. One we'd have been very happy with if you'd offered us that at the start of the day. This puts us leading the regatta!! A pretty nice position to be in but more importantly no bad races picked up.
I spoke to friends back in the UK and they said they'd been up at 6 to watch the racing live! Pretty cool knowing we've got all this support.
Today we move course to racing area B a bit further east and away from the marina for another 3 races. If we get all the races in we have a rest day tomorrow.

Measurement

At the Games the measurement procedure is a pretty long process, each boat taking around 2 hrs to check. Most of these checks are the standard things that always get checked at any large event but with the Olympics there are so many branding regulations even sail manufacturer logos have to be the right size! The other different thing is the stickers. According to our coach the last few Games there have been professionals to apply the stickers (National flags / Letters / Names / Event logo) to the sails and the hull. Unfortunately for us this year there aren't, so we've had to apply them ourselves. This was taking some teams up to 4hrs to sticker a main sail! We managed to do it in around 1hr but have just been informed that the stickers themselves might be too poor a quality and might fall off and that a new batch has been ordered! Pretty annoying if that's the case, at least we only wasted an hour not four.

Entering the Olympic Marina and Shanghai Holding Camp

Sorry I haven't added any updates to the blog for awhile, its been fairly hectic!
We flew out last Tuesday with fellow Devonian sailor Joe Glanfield as well as a number of other athletes including Linford Christie! Though Linford was in first class he still said 'Hi' to us. We are so separate from the main scene in Beijing you don't think about seeing other athletes.
We arrived in Qingdao to heavy rain and the forecast of more the following day with a potential typhoon warning in the near vicinity. We went down to Yin Hai marina the following day with the hope of sailing our kit round to the Olympic marina, a couple of miles down the coast, but on arriving at Yin Hai we found 20kt winds and waves breaking over the sea wall into the marina. After checking the slipway, which is a floating pontoon, we found it moving up and down by about 6ft and decided there was no chance of launching without serious risk to our equipment.
We left the boat till the following day and went to explore the Olympic marina on foot. It gave us a chance to register and find our way round the new buildings that have been built since last year. This includes the athlete accommodation block which will be a 5 star hotel. Though we're not staying there we have access to the facilities which include plush rooms, swimming pool, food halls and a massage spa.
The team has done a great job and made it a much more pleasant place to relax whilst waiting for races.
We managed to tow round the following day as the wind disappeared again. It was made harder by the massive swell left over from the day before and would have been much easier to sail had there been any wind. Thanks to Jez the Finn coach for stepping in and helping us.
On our final day before the holding camp we went down early and squeezed in a sail before having to jump on the bus for the airport.
The last few days have been spent in Shanghai resting and preparing for the real thing. It's a bit of a shame to not have been able to join up with the rest of Team GB but the main holding camp was in Macau, which for us was nearly 8hrs travel away.
We're now back in Qingdao and have four days before racing starts. Today we are measuring in our boat and equipment, cross fingers everything's fine!

Road to Beijing

Just a quick note to say you can hear us on BBC 5 live tonight on the 'Road to Beijing' program from 8.

Last week at home

So we've been back for a week now. It's been great. We've both had a chance to get some space and relax, something thats going to be quite hard to do in a weeks time!
The weathers been great so I've been out on my bike everyday enjoying it and topped it off with a camping trip to the Northern beaches of Devon.
We set off for Bejing on Tuesday morning, travelling out with fellow Devonian Joe Glanfield. We go straight to Qingdao with the aim of sailing our kit round from our training marina to the Olympic venue before heading off to Shanghai for a holding camp.

Last day

Our final training camp in Qingdao finishes today. We have just enough time to go for one more training session this morning before we have to pack the boats away ready to go into the Olympic marina.

The last few days have been good. We lost one day to no wind but the final day of racing saw us starting to find some good pace and has left us in confident spirits on our kit decisions.
Yesterday, for the first day since we've been here the wind really thumped in bringing with it a large sea. It made for some fun sailing especially seeing some of our rivals struggling to keep control.
Contrary to what most of the media is saying, the weed problem although better is still far from fixed. At points in the racing our tactics were completely governed by weed avoidance. It would be a real issue if this is still the case during the Olympics. Having said that full credit to the Chinese who are definately doing everything possible to prevent that being the case.

We're home for about a week before flying back out here. The time at home will be spent resting and preparing mentally. It's been a good training camp and especially nice to be staying somewhere different. (This week we've been in a local apartment but when we get back we will be in team accomodation). We've kept ourselves busy even when the wind hasn't played ball. Stevie's been engrossed in the Spooks box set whilst I've been following the text updates on the Tour De France. Truly inspiring reading about British success. Nice one Cav!

Foggy

Still going well out here although the fog has once again slowed up proceedings. The Danish team organised a mini regatta to be run yesterday and today. We had good conditions yesterday and did 4 races as well as an hour of tuning. Racing went ok though we definitely weren't as sharp as we'd like to be. I think its down to our minds being focused on tuning and gear selection and not on the racing.
We went down today but the fog rolled in and visibility dropped to around 50m plus there was no wind so racing was abandoned. There was a funny 'lost in translation' moment which caused quite a bit of panic though. Word got round that the Chinese were not going to let us launch or sail on the Olympic waters from today onwards! So as you can imagine the whole team started worrying about training and phone calls and emails were flying around trying to find out why. As it turns out what the Chinese were tying to say is that they didn't recommend us sailing today because of the fog warning!
The plan now is to re-run the racing missed today tomorrow.

In the meantime we have managed to come to some more decisions over kit so far from a wasted day.

Feeling proud!!

We've spent the last few days testing sails and masts trying to decide on a suit for the Games. It's been pretty exciting to have a Union Jack flying in front of the boat ( a first for both of us). Its been very light but sailable and we seem to be making progress.
Some of the other nations are organising a mini regatta starting tomorrow for the 49ers. I think we might go and join in, see how we're matching up.

Little Miss Pipedream

Having spent the last few days working hard to get her ready for her premier launch, we rode down to the club in torrential rain. Not the sort of conditions we would have liked to launch her.
Anyway sure enough by the time we were ready to push off the clouds parted and the rain stopped. As most of you know we always name our boats after girls in songs and so with a can of TsingTsao Beer we named her 'Little Miss Pipedream' (A song by the Wombats).
The breeze held up for the duration of our sail and she seemed to be pretty good. Big thanks to Simon Hiscocks for helping prepare her back in the UK.
We now have a week of practise in her to make sure she is the one but things look promising.

First days in China

Hi folks,
Just got to China yesterday. We're here for two weeks training with our training partners John Pink and Rick Peacock. The days prior to our arrival have been pretty wet or so the rest of the team’s training out here have told us. It sounds like we have got pretty lucky so far as although the wind has been light its stayed dry and been about as comfortable as it gets here!
For the first few days our time will mainly be spent working on the new boat preparing her for her premier launch. We've been re-doing the slot gaskets on the hull and rudder stock so we're crossing fingers that they go off and finish well.
As many of you might have heard there is a major problem with seaweed over here. On the way from the airport we saw that the Chinese have closed off a lane on the highway so the weed lorries can get through. When we got to the coast the operation we can see is just massive! There are fishing boats as far as the eye can see (which isn't very far admittedly given the visibility!) all hauling nets pulling out the weed. This is then being brought ashore and taken away in the lorries. They also have the army involved moving the stuff by hand. (See pic).
We got on the water today and it was pretty good. The weed wasn't too big an issue, just a few calculated swerves needed to avoid the worst of it and the wind was around 8kts.
Hopefully launch the new boat in a couple of days given good fortune and wind.

Kiel Week

After our slow start to the year we decided to drop a tip to China from our program to make way for more racing. The event that took the place was last week in Kiel, North Germany. Although a Grade 1 ranked event we haven't been to Kiel for a number of years because it's clashed with World or European Championships. Its an odd event because its run during Kiel Festival and its kind of like doing a 49er event in the middle of Cowes week. A bit hectic!!!
It didn't start all that well for us as upon landing we found out our apartment had been booked out to another team leaving us with the coaches floor for the night. We managed to sort things the next day and ended up staying in an attic flat with an old lady! The flat can only be described as dated but it was seriously cheap. We had a few amusing run ins with the old lady throughout the week as she lost count of the date and tried to get extra rent out of us! Though I'm not so sure she wasn't just play acting!

Having sent all our good kit to China we were a little sure as to how the week would play out, but we were pleasantly surprised when we seemed to be on the pace despite old kit.
During the racing we had moments when we sailed great and hence won quite a few races. Unfortunately we also had moments where we ballsed it up!

On the whole we learn't a lot about focusing on the right attitude to certain racing situations and by the end of the week felt we had the mistakes more under control.

IOC Regulations

Hi everyone,
I guess you're probably wondering why we have two blogs running? Basically the IOC (International Olympic Committee) don't allow any form of advertising or branding during the Games period. So our regular website breaks these regulations, because of the association with our sponsors, the branded photos of the boat etc...
Because of this we thought it easier to have this blog running alongside for the duration of the Games. Hopefully you'll be able to follow our progress on here.

We have recently joined the Lenovo summer games blogger program, which is a scheme designed to get the voices of the athletes competing out to the world without having to go through the media. http://summergames.lenovo.com/