| |||
|
July 1st '08
Green Fields in Qingdao
With our next China camp set to start in a week, it looks as though we'll have to deal with some more unique problems offered by the Qingdao venue. In June we sailed around some large algae beds, but pictures and reports show that the algae problem is now huge.
Kiel Week
The racing at Kiel this year probably won't have much similarity to the Olympics, but it was a great chance to 'stretch our legs' and gain some perspective on our light wind preparations. All 16 races were completed, most of them sailed in shifty offshore winds that made for a lot of passes and up and down results. The regatta was good practice, although our overall finish of 18th shows how many mistakes were made.
Complete scores are online here.
June 1st, '08
Television Interview
Ben and RSXer Zack Plavsic were interviewed on CTV. Download the clip here.
Sailing Qingdao Style
With two months left before the games, most of our training is happening in Qingdao. The weather tends to be hazy, but the statue of the Mazu, goddess of the sea (below) is still bright most days.
So far we've gotten lots of hours on the water, and we're looking forward to racing and training in whatever currents, ocean waves, and winds Qingdao has in store for us.
March 30' 08
Tough Qualifying Races
It was a tough couple of events in Palma this March. After missing some shifts and getting black flagged in the Princess Sofia event to end up in Silver fleet, we managed to sail slowly through the Europeans qualifying series to end up one spot out of Gold fleet a second time.
On the bright side we won the silver fleet racing at both events. The conditions were great as well, with a sea breeze filling in most days around noon, some large ocean swell and the typical palma choppy water keeping things interesting. Our sailing did seem to be back on track for most of the silver fleet racing, altough it is certainly dissapointing to be left out of the Gold fleet. Congradulations to Iker Martinez and Xavier Fernadez for winning their second consecutive European Championship. Our next regatta we'll be the in Hyeres.. racing is scheduled to start April 20th.
Gearing up for the Europeans
Well its high time for an update from the campaign. After a couple of training camps on the west coast, and a regatta here in Palma, we're ready to sail the Europeans.
The Europeans will certainly be the biggest 49er Championship before the Olympic Games, so we'll be looking to do well here as well as get some valuable practice racing against the fleet. The forecast for the event is calling for some windy days, as well as some more normal days between fronts. At the very least we'll have some days sailing in the difficult Palma choppy water. Day 1 has been cancelled due to high winds, but results should be up here once racing gets underway.
Day 1 was a better day for kiteboarding
January 14th '08
2008 World Championship
The 2008 Worlds are already over, and it's been a great event for us. After a qualifying series that put in the gold fleet in 23rd spot, we moved up the rankings steadily over two days to end up 13th overall. This is an improvement over our finish last July at the 2007 Worlds of 19th, and it felt great to move up the rankings once the top 25 gold fleet racing was underway. We fell just short of finishing in the top ten and sailing in the medal race, but we've shown that we have what it takes to compete with the best in the fleet.
Many thanks to our coach Lea Sitja, who did an excellent job of coaching us during the worlds and also during to two months of training leading up to the event. Lea was very helpful in figuring out the keys to sucess on the worlds race courses, and also in identifying areas to work on during training sessions.
Sorrento, Vic, Australia was a great venue to sail the worlds in, with flat water for the most part, winds from 5 up to 25 knots, and sunny Aussie summer weather throughout the event. The results and event website are at this link. As well, there are virtual views of all the gold fleet races available to watch here.
Now that the worlds out of the way, the focus is even more on the sailing in Qingdao. With a super light wind regatta predicted by many, we'll be focusing on working on light wind sailing. Our next training camp will be in San Diego, which should have some of the elements of light winds and tidal currents that are dominant in Qingdao.
Some breezy photos. We were leading this race at the first leeward gate after a difficult downwind leg.
- Thanks to the US Virgin Islands Sailing Team for the great pictures.
