GREAT BRITAIN secured their fourth sailing medal of the Olympic Games yesterday through Chris Draper and Simon Hiscocks in the 49er class. The pair are now guaranteed at least a bronze medal but are still well within reach of silver. Britain, who were the top sailing nation at Sydney four years ago, look on course to repeat the feat, although Brazil and the United States could still take the top honour if either manage three golds.
Draper and Hiscocks went into an exciting day’s racing in the famous Meltemi wind on the Saronic Gulf yesterday in second place behind Iker Martínez and Xavier Fernandez, the in-form pair from Spain, and still with high hopes of challenging for gold. However, after winning the first heat, race 13 in the series, they struggled with the windshifts in races 14 and 15, finishing ninth and sixth respectively.
This dropped them from second to third overall behind Rodion Luka and George Leonchuk, of Ukraine, who are now two points ahead of them. With only one more race to come tomorrow, the Spanish pair, a further nine points clear, look to be in a strong position to take gold. Draper and Hiscocks could still win if the leaders perform badly, but they are more likely to be scrapping with the Ukrai nians for second place.
The Britons came to Athens as strong candidates, alongside Spain, for the Olympic title and they were bitterly disappointed last night to have let their rivals get so far ahead. The key moment yesterday came early in the second race — heat 14. After starting well in a strong breeze heading up the left-hand side of the first leg, they decided to switch to the right, taking several sterns as they did so.
It was a decisive move but it proved an expensive mistake and by the time they reached the first mark and unfurled their Union Jack spinnaker, they were down in fourteenth position. They then had a real fight on their hands to recover to ninth at the death, while the Ukraine pair were fifth and the Spain pair second.
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In race 15, Draper and Hiscocks made another good start and their gold medal hopes briefly improved when the Spain pair mistimed their own start and crossed the line a few seconds late. But while the Britons ran into a light patch in the breeze, this time at the top of the course on the left, Martínez and Fernandez worked the right-hand side and popped out at the first mark in second place.
Once again, the Britons did well to come back from tenth at that stage to finish sixth but the Spanish, in fourth place and the Ukrainians, in third, finished ahead of them. It was typically up and down 49er stuff, not for the faint-hearted, and Draper emerged rueing the two errors that had cost them dear.
“We were pretty upset when we came ashore and we’re pretty disappointed,” he said. “We didn’t really feel we sailed our best in those two last races. We didn’t get the first beats right and from there we were always trying to get back in. We could still possibly win it but it’s fairly unlikely. But we will go out and do everything we possibly can in the last race.”
In the Star class, Iain Percy and Steve Mitchell’s form picked up in the stronger winds of the Meltemi and they finished the day’s only race — the sixth of the series — in third place, moving them up to seventh overall.
That may not sound too good for Britain’s medal hopes in this class but there is some way to go yet and Percy and Mitchell are only three points off Paul Cayard and Phil Trinter, of the United States, in third place.
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WHERE THEY STAND
OPEN DOUBLE-HANDED DINGHY, 49ER: Chris Draper and Simon Hiscocks, third after 15 of 16 races.
MEN’S WINDSURFER, MISTRAL: Nick Dempsey, fourth after 10 of 11 races.
MEN’S KEELBOAT, STAR: Iain Percy and Steve Mitchell, seventh after 6 of 11 races.
WOMEN’S WINDSURFER, MISTRAL: Natasha Sturges, eleventh after 10 of 11 races.
OPEN MULTIHULL, TORNADO: Leigh McMillan and Mark Bulkeley, fourteenth after 6 of 11 races.