Summer of Speed
I’m not entirely sure where the last few months have gone, it has been one of those blink and you miss it kind of summers and after being wiped out for the last 10 days with a really nasty cold, thankfully not Covid I have been able to arrange some of my thoughts from the last few months!
There’s been highs and lows as usual and a few things which have reminded me the power of elite level sport both on yourself as well as the power it can have on others. Obviously the Olympics was a huge highlight for everyone this summer and whilst I still feel a pang of sadness and perhaps envy that I didn’t achieve my Olympic dream, it was so great to see friends achieve their dreams and pick up their well deserved Olympic Medals. There were a few things that spoke to me during this Olympics and one of them being how in your face it all is - if you didn’t make the Olympic team for Tokyo 2020 then I can only imagine how painful it is that the media surrounding it is literally everywhere, I think I took two weeks off Facebook during Rio 2016 but this time round it literally is inescapable with athletes posting on all forms of social media multiple times a day (this is the first Games that most athletes have had their phones during competition), whilst it is amazing to celebrate the successes of those who bring home medals, I couldn’t help but spare a thought for those who are World Class Athletes but were sat at home. Particularly in sailing where we have such amazing depth of talent in the UK but can only send one team per class. I understand that we need to encourage representation from a wide range of Nations for sailing to maintain it’s Olympic status but it still doesn’t sit easy with me that you pour your heart and soul (and money and energy from friends and family and literally everything you have at your disposal) into an Olympic campaign, gain a World Ranking of perhaps top 5 or top 10 but you have to sit out competing on the biggest stage because there is someone from your home nation who is also a strong International contender.
In terms of my own sailing, it has also been a bit of a rollercoaster. All year we had been putting together a campaign for the Rolex Fastnet Race, warming up with the RORC series and competing inshore to check all of the modifications that had been made to the boat during the lockdowns would be effective, only to be hit with a couple of cases of Covid-19 within the crew the week before which led to us, rather than battling the 30 knots winds on the start line, confined to our homes and watching the drama unfold on the live coverage. It was a surreal feeling to be sat warm and dry whilst all of the boats were heading out of the Solent. I followed the race on the tracker and this would have been my third Fastnet Race - it was interesting to see the strategical choices, particularly around the Scillies and Casquets TSS on the way to the finish as these seemed to be real strategical decision points which ended up being crucial to the overall finish times, with two huge tidal gates so late on in the race - pretty glad I’m not a Navigator for that reason!!
By far and away, the most amazing experience I’ve had this summer was the opportunity to join SailGP GBR for two events, in Plymouth and in Aarhus as part of the Female Athlete trials. I know most of the girls from the other teams pretty well so I had a bit of an insight before heading down to Plymouth and it was so good to be back in that real high performance environment. The weather was amazing for the Plymouth event and the thousands of people turning out to watch was really cool. There’s a huge amount to learn about these boats and the British team in particular are really experienced in this sort of sailing with most of them having been involved in the America’s Cup in 2017 in Bermuda which was the origin of the F50. My first experience of the boats was on one of the training days when I hopped on the back straight into a practise start which we were a bit late lining up for - I clipped on to my tether and we were off at 30 knots into the start box, on port with 6 boats approaching us at 30 knots on Starboard! All I had to do was cross sides and not get in the way but I was trying to take in as much as I could about how the boats were sailed. The racing is intense and just because the speeds are faster, it doesn’t mean the margins in the crosses and the ducks get and bigger! It’s a really odd scenario sat at the back in the 6th sailor position because normally when you’re sailing you feel as though you have an element of control if you’re holding a sheet or steering but with both hands empty, you feel so disconnected and it really reduces your ability to anticipate. I found the same thing during the Volvo when you spend hours trimming the mainsheet without driving, the feedback from the boat is so dull in comparison to holding the wheel so your communication has to be really comprehensive to make sure you’re in sync with the helm.
I was really excited to get another opportunity to join the team in Aarhus, Denmark for the next leg of Sail GP and it was a completely different experience! Rather than a lovely 8-12 knots and bright sunshine like we had in Plymouth (who would have thought it!) We had 3-23 knots, 14 degrees and rain! For the training days the small 18m wings were on and wow are they a different beast! During the practise racing we hit 53.05 knots/98.2km/h in the bear away - the fastest ever speed recorded on an F50, which felt insane! In the 6th position you are pretty sheltered so it didn’t feel as wild as I thought it would (having experienced some pretty big stuffs in other boats at 20-25knots), but I got some pretty impressive bruises from trying to stay on the boat! It was epic to be able to soak up so much from being involved with the team again and hopefully it won’t be long before there are female sailors on board for racing. After some really gusty/windy training days, obviously the weather would turn and there would be 5 knots for race days!! The team finished up third after a bit of a controversial umpire decision in the final race, it’s really interesting to see how the umpired racing differs from other disciplines within the sport - the umpires are not at the event, they watch from an office with the video feed and computer software from the boats and the skippers get the opportunity to discuss the calls after racing as this format is relatively new with 8 boats racing with such high boat speeds boundaries surrounded by spectator boats!
My illness coincided nicely with the only bit of down time I had planned this year so whilst it felt like a bit of a waste, at least I didn’t have to pull out of anything and the next few months are looking just as busy with the last few events on the Solent, the Southampton Boat Show, some coaching and heading back for Year 2 of my Physiotherapy degree!
