Andy Rice

It looks like Tokyo 2021 will happen despite the problems posed by a worldwide pandemic. This is good news but it offers up even more challenges for the competitors

Where would Olympic sailing be without the Portuguese grinders late into the night on the eve of the Olympic Regatta in Qingdao 2008. Most of the Star fleet had been ruled out of class and were engaged in a race against time to get their hulls into a legal haven of Vilamoura? This resort in shape before race one. The current crop the Algarve has been the saviour of of Olympic classes shouldn’t have too international competition for many many problems, although recent years of the Olympic classes while all else have seen some Nacra 17s struggle to in Europe and most of the rest of pass the measurement process. That’s the world has been cancelled. The a headache that no one will have the 470 fleets had their Worlds there time for in the short and frenetic in March and are back on the same build-up to this Olympic Regatta. Atlantic waters for their European Heading up the team is the RYA’s Championships just six weeks Olympic performance manager Mark later. The Finns have just had their Robinson, with the RYA’s director of European Championships there and ‘HOW RELIEVED MUST THE racing Ian Walker operating in Tokyo as move to the north of Portugal for the Finn Gold Cup in Porto in early May. RYA SELECTORS HAVE a floater, a ‘minister without portfolio’ as Ian described it to me. Ian is there to slot

How relieved must the RYA BEEN TO HAVE MADE SUCH in to help in whatever way he’s needed, selectors have been to have made such early calls on who would EARLY CALLS ON TOKYO!’ leaving Mark clear to run the scheduled, day-to-day operations. As one of the be going to Tokyo! Most of the few nations to have sailors competing British team was announced in September 2019 and the last in all 10 events, the RYA’s declared medal target is between to be announced was Elliot Hanson in the Laser at the end of four to seven medals of any colour. That seems like a tall order, February 2020, just as COVID was beginning to engulf Europe. especially with all the curveballs that Tokyo could hurl at the The idea of carrying on with Olympic campaigning through a athletes. Aside from all the uncertainty that COVID has brought year of such uncertainty, not even knowing if you would earn into the equation, there is the extreme heat, the extreme waves selection - mentally that must have been very hard indeed. and, according to team meteorologist Simon Rowell, the strong

For the teams that have been battling for Tokyo qualification possibility of a typhoon and/or tsunami at that time of year. at events in Portugal and other venues such as Oman for Whatever happens, I hope the media is given the freedom the Asian nation selections, they will barely have time to to cover the event and do justice to what could be the most hose down their boats after qualifying before they load their spectacular sailing conditions ever experienced at an Olympic equipment into containers bound directly for Japan. venue. Five years ago in Rio there was the travesty of all the TV

With less than a hundred days to the start of the Games, it cameras pointing at a postponement flag hanging limply over the looks increasingly likely that the Olympics will take place in inner race courses while on the other side of Sugarloaf Mountain some form. But it will be the strangest, most soulless experience the Finns and 470s were battling through the most monstrous imaginable. Like an extreme form of lockdown but with TV waves that those experienced athletes had ever encountered cameras following their every move. A bit like the Truman in their careers. And no TV footage of such a wild day! Show, or Big Brother, or the Hunger Games, take your pick! The lack of spectators at the Games won’t affect sailing

There was due to be a World Cup event at the Olympic nearly so much as the stadium sports and if that’s what it Regatta venue of Enoshima in June. Most sailors would have takes to get this Games away, so be it. Currently I’m still incorporated that warm-up event into a long training session, down to be writing for World Sailing at the sailing venue, then fly home to rest and recuperate before travelling back although I’m not holding my breath. Having attended the out to Tokyo perhaps two to three weeks before the Opening past three Games in Beijing, London and Rio it would be a Ceremony. Now the sailors are being told that the earliest they shame to break the chain. But the most important thing is might be permitted to land in Tokyo is just five days before the for the sailors and other athletes across every sport to get first race. Five days to get used to a new time zone, to acclimatise ANDY RICE their chance to shine. If this has to be a Lockdown Games, to the high heat and energy-sapping humidity of mid-summer As a sailing journalist it’s better than no Games at all. We sailors drew immense Tokyo, and five days to get boats and equipment out of 40ft and TV commentator Andy has unparalleled pleasure and inspiration from following the Vendée Globe and containers, not to mention trying to get safely through the knowledge of the America’s Cup from afar. On a much grander scale, the 2021 extensive measurement process without any hiccups. dinghy sailing scene, from grassroots to Olympic Games have the potential to bring cheer and unity

I can still remember the whining scream of multiple angle Olympic level to the world at a time when it’s needed more than ever.

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