BACK ON THEIR FEET

After a dismal showing in 2012, the U.S. Olympic sailing team has plans to get back on the podium at this year’s Games—and in the years to come

Thus did Dean Brenner, the outgoing head of the U.S. Olympic Sailing Program, describe the shellacking his team experienced at the 2012 London Olympics, when it failed to win a single medal at the sailing venue in Weymouth.

But did they really? Did the team’s failure to get a single sailor on the podium really come as a complete surprise? And did things really go off the rails as badly as it seemed?

First, a reminder of just how bad it was. Not only did the 2012 Olympic regatta represent the first time the United States failed to win a single medal since the 1936 Games in Berlin, Germany, but it was a year in which the U.S. team had actually hoped to turn things around.

Ever since the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, in which the United States finished well down in the overall medal count with just a pair of bronzes, there had been growing concern the team was failing to keep up with the completion. In the years that followed, it had some notable successes, including a fourmedal effort spearheaded by a dramatic comefrom-behind overall victory by Mark Reynolds and Magnus Liljedahl in the Star class at the Sydney Games, and gold for Anna Tunnicliffe in the Laser Radial class at the Beijing Olympics. However, there was no getting around the fact that the United States still failed on each occasion to crack the top three in terms of medal counts.

In the run-up to the games the 2012 Games, the U.S. team had worked hard to increase its cohesion and provide its sailors with more resources, thanks to the financial support of organizations like the Sperry company. It had also updated its selection process, requiring sailors to compete at the international level for spots on the final team, as opposed to just competing again other sailors in the United States.

In the end, though, at Weymouth the U.S. team was only able to even finish in the top 10 in three of the 10 classes: women’s match racing, the Laser Radial and Star classes. The best finish out of the bunch was a fifth in the match-racing event.

REGROUPING FOR RIO

Fortunately, if there’s one thing Americans do well, it’s pick themselves back up again after they’ve been knocked down. And that’s exactly what the team

“We ran full-speed into something we weren’t expecting.”

so that it can hone its skills against the best of the best. Of course, this kind of thing is neither easy on the sailors nor cheap. But according to Adams, it’s an essential part of becoming competitive at the Olympic level, given the increasingly professionalized training regimens that have become the norm in any number of other countries, such as New Zealand, Australia, China and Great Britain.

As for coaching, one of the Olympic Sailing Committee’s earliest moves after it met in late 2012 to do a post mortem on Weymouth was bring in two-time Olympic bronze medalist Charlie McKee to serve as the team’s high performance director—a kind of “head coach” for the entire Olympic sailing effort.

“My job is to guide the long-term direction of the team with Josh, make sure our priorities are in line with our goals and guide the training of the athletes, and work with individual coaches,” says McKee, whose medals came in the 470 and 49er classes in the 1988 and 2000 Olympics, summing up his role with respect to the rest of the team.

At the same time, while admitting that he “watches a lot of racing” McKee emphasizes that his approach is a flexible one in which he allows the individual coaches to tailor their coaching to the unique needs of the various different sailors and teams: a smart strategy given that the final Olympic roster alone includes 15 sailors and 13 different coaches and training staff.

It also makes sense given the depth of coaching talent McKee has on hand, including such veterans as longtime Olympic coach Luther Carpenter, Mark Reynolds, Morgan Reeser, Mark Littlejohn and Dave Ullman, who was recently recognized as a Coach of the Year for his efforts. In all, the staff can claim more than twodozen medals earned as sailors or coaches to its credit—an impressive resume.

Equally impressive, says McKee, is the way a number of this year’s Olympic alternates have stepped up to help with the current team’s final preparations by serving as training partners out on the water.

“It’s a really positive thing,” McKee says, citing the way athletes like Laser Radial sailor Erika Reineke, and 49er sailors Judge Ryan and Hans Henken, have been spending weeks helping their teammates during their final tune ups. Also pitching in down in Rio are Nacra 17 sailor Sarah Newberry and 49er sailor Trevor

By Rob Kothe (founder of Australia’s TetraMedia sailing communications company)