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.