Our first start was very close, with both teams coming to the line early, we thought we’d made a good start and gained the dominant right hand side, but unfortunately we were judged to be over and had to restart, trailing by some margin for the rest of the match. The second and third matches were very close, but we didn’t manage to nail the starts and although always threatening we couldn’t pass to take a race win.

While we’re disappointed with the defeat in the finals today, overall we’re very pleased to come away with a medal here on home waters in the biggest test yet at the 2012 venue.

We’re delighted to also have been confirmed entry to the official Olympic Test Event which will be held in Weymouth & Portland in August, where only the top 12 nations will be permitted to send a single team, as it will be in the Olympics next year. So we now two more months of training to turn that Silver into a Gold! :)

Many thanks for all the support we’ve received this week, both from our sponsors, supporters, and friends and family cheering us on.

First up was our quarter final matches against Mandy Mulder (NED). We won the first, then they levelled the score. We won the third, then they equalised again, making it 2–2 and a winner takes all in the 5th. The deciding match was close, but after a good start we maintained the dominant position and a small lead throughout to go through 3–2.

Our semi-final was against Sally Barkow (USA). Sally won the pre-start in the first match, and went on to win. There was drama in second match at the leward mark as Barkow was given two penalties, the second of which has to be taken immediately. This allowed us to sail to an easy win and bring the score level at 1–1. In the third match we picked up a penalty in the last few seconds of the pre-start, but maintained control and extended our lead such that we could take the penalty at the 2nd windward mark. This put us neck-and-neck with Barkow on the final run, and a close battle ensued. Several gybes and a bit of a luffing match saw Barkow given first one and then a second penalty meaning again that they have to stop to take one immediately, letting us cruise in to the finish and a 2–1 lead. In the fourth match we had a good pre-start managing to inflict a penalty on Barkow and lead away in a controlling position off the line. The race was again extremely close, though they didn’t manage to take their penalty and we won the semis 3–1.

Tomorrow sees us race for gold in the Finals against Anna Tunnicliffe (USA), Barkow will face Claire Leroy (FRA) in the petit final to decide bronze.

Time for some rest now, then bring on tomorrow!

Check out the video summary of the day below, including interview starting at about 2:20

We’re also looking forward to having our support boat out tomorrow!

Lucy

Check out the video and interview with Lucy below!

The day started with three rounds of the Repechage before we were sent out for the Gold Group. A course re-shuffle saw the match race fleet move inside the harbour to allow the 49ers to take the most sheltered water in Newton’s Cove. Conditions inside are actually worse than in the shelter of the North wall, making the down wind legs particularly challenging with the ever-present danger of a nose dive!

In our first race, a confident start over Nicky Souter (AUS) saw us win the favoured starboard end of the line and defend the starboard side up the first beat. A slight error at the first windward mark saw us pick up a penalty as we were judged to have tacked too close, but we rounded ahead. An exciting run with speeds regularly hitting 10 knots saw us extend, and we had a good second beat. At the second windward mark we had enough lead to round, sail outside two boat lengths and then tack, offloading our penalty and coming back at the mark in an attacking position on starboard as Souter rounded on port. The final run was neck and neck all the way, with a photo finish at the line. After some deliberation on board the committee boat the blue flag was flown, signalling the win was awarded to Souter.

The second race of the day for us was against Le Berre (FRA) in which we dominated the pre-start, inflicting two penalties on our opponents. This means that they had to take one penalty turn immediately after starting, leaving us to sail away and extend our lead to a comfortable win of over 150m. The conditions continued to deteriorate throughout the race with the average wind speed moving into the high 20s, and a nasty chop building. Boat speeds down wind were hitting 12 knots with some interesting submarine-ing moments! Exhilarating racing but hard work physically and a good test of the boat handling and concentration!

Some of the other boats suffered minor damage and with the wind increasing racing was then postponed for the day.

Tomorrow sees a slightly revised schedule with the repechage again at an earlier first start of 0930, then we’ll be out mid-morning for the completion of the gold fleet. The forecast is for a more manageable 15 knots so hopefully they can catch up on the schedule.

Follow the results and twitter feed at http://www.matchracegirls.com/sail-for-gold/2011/

Today we completed the stage 1 round robin, sailing the remaining three matches in Group C. In the first, against Hahlbrock (GER) we had a good start and controlled up the beat, but unfortunately picked up a penalty on the first run. We continued to lead around the course but didn’t manage to extend enough of a lead to take the penalty so took our first loss. Race 2 saw a win over Meldgaard (DEN).

Race 3 started with a furious pre-start against Tunnicliffe (USA), from which we emerged neck-and-neck. A close race but we didn’t manage to pass, so finished on 5–2. This puts us 2nd in Group C behind Tunnicliffe, but with the all important guaranteed entry to the quarter finals which is always the aim!

We’re trying to keep tabs on the results this week at
http://www.matchracegirls.com/sail-for-gold/2011/
this page automatically loads updates so you don’t have to keep refreshing!

Tomorrow the Match Racing will be using the GPS trackers so you should also be able to watch our progress around the course — scroll down to see the match racing flights.

Off for some much needed rest, it was a full-on day today and tomorrow promises more of the same! We’ll be out to do three gold group matches, probably starting around 1pm.

Breeze looks like its starting to die out again but fingers crossed we’ll get at least three of our races today. Follow the racing at the Skandia Sail for Gold Regatta website.

Lucy

Team Volvo for life Match Race Girls — Lloyd Images

It has been great to have been able to spend the last month down in Weymouth, training hard and getting in some good hours on the water ahead of the Skandia Sail for Gold Regatta. Last week in particular we had some pretty strong breezes but it was all from a fairly similar direction so there has not been much chopping and changing in the conditions. No doubt we will get something completely different when the regatta is going on!

We don’t mind that though, we haven’t really got favourite conditions as a team and although we have spent a lot of time training at Weymouth and Portland it is still not enough. We have still got loads to learn about certain conditions in the venue and the different courses, which is why every single time you go out on the water you take something new from it.

The Match Race Girls training in Palma — Credit Lloyd images

Skandia Sail for Gold is an important regatta for us but we are always looking at the long-term goal of London 2012 so not all our training has been geared to the next week.

We go into Sail for Gold full of confidence though. It was really nice to win gold in Hyeres [French Olympic sailing week - forth leg of the ISAF World Cup Sailing series] . With Kate only joining us towards the back end of last year and then our campaign taking a bit of a hit when Annie was injured in Miami [Rolex Miami OCR- second leg or the ISAF World Sailing series]  in January, we haven’t actually had that long together as a team. There were a few particular areas we had worked on in the build-up to Hyeres and it was a really good feeling when they came together. It showed the hard work we have been doing was paying off and we were on the right track. It was probably the most together and strong that we have felt as a team, both in the boat and around each other.

The Match Race Girls training in Palma — Credit Lloyd images

It has been getting really busy in Weymouth and you can tell that the other teams are beginning to take it much more seriously as the Olympic venue this year but the venue is geared up to take large numbers of people and seems to be handling everything fine. We are still trying to get as much from the venue as possible but so are all the other teams and I’m sure by the time the Olympics start there won’t be a huge amount of difference in the amount of time we have all spent preparing on the Olympic race courses.

We’ve enjoyed a couple of days off this week, just to give our minds and bodies a bit of a rest before the regatta starts. When you are in the middle of a hard period of training seeing friends etc can be difficult so it was nice to catch up with a few people and just spend some time pottering around the house and enjoy being at home.

This weekend there are a couple of practice slots that we will be taking advantage of just to get out on the water for a couple of hours but we haven’t got too much to do and hopefully it will be a pretty laid back couple of days before we start racing on Monday.

Lucy

This week we have had a good 3 days training in Weymouth with some up-and-coming Kiwi guys who are in Europe for the Match race tour this summer. They have had a lot of experience in the Elliotts so they were able to whip us into shape a bit in the 15knots we had most of the week.

Tomorrow we are loading two of our boats to go and be used for the Delta Lloyd Regatta in Holland, however we will not be competing there because we have chosen to focus on Weymouth and the Skandia Sail for Gold Regatta which takes place at the being of June.

After tomorrow we have a few days off to play with our new Volvo, thanks to Team Volvo for Life, then we’re back to Weymouth to play with our pair of brand new boats! (suggestions for names anyone?!)

Stay tuned…

Kate x

The season started with a silver medal in the first world cup series event in Miami, this was a great way to start the season however also showed we needed to make the most of the forthcoming training.   After Miami we based ourselves in Palma, Mallorca for training where we brought in different coaches and training partners, a huge leap forward before the main season commenced.  The next two World cup events were in Palma and Hyeres, where, unfortunately we ended up with a 5^th and 4^th but were still showing a lot of potential.

In June the RYA chose to mix and match teams, with the match race squad reducing in numbers and some crews changing.  One of those changes was Ally leaving our team and Kate, Lucy’s younger sister, joining the team.  Although this was a difficult change at the time, it did happen very smoothly and we are delighted to say, after following her Engineering degree, Ally has settled into a fantastic new job with a lot of potential.  While having to juggle both university and sailing, Kate is working extremely hard but fitting in really well and the three of us are really enjoying working together.

The summer was busy with events, including the European championships where we achieved a Silver medal and a Bronze medal at the Stena Match Cup, Sweden.  One of the bigger events of the year was the Skandia Sail for Gold Regatta in the Olympic venue, Weymouth.  Although we were a new team at the time we were feeling good in the running up to the event and were hoping to medal.  The first 2 rounds went well for us until we reached the quarter finals where we were up against the American team, we managed to fight back after being 2-0 down to 2-2, then unfortunately lost the deciding race meaning we did not make it through to the semi finals.  In the following round we were back on form and ended up 5^th overall but were definitely disappointed with our week.

Most classes would have had time off after their busy summer however we were straight back into it with the World Championships just around the corner!

For the worlds the Sonar was used instead of our Elliott 6ms, meaning we had a lot to learn about the boats in the 2 weeks training we did.  We had two great weeks training in Sheboygan, USA and Cowes, giving us a good feeling going into the regatta which was at the end of September in Newport, Rhode Island.  The conditions for the week were tricky but it was great for racing.  We sailed through the opening rounds very smoothly and made it to the semi finals against two times World Champion Claire Leroy from France.  The semi finals was extremely close we were 2-1 ahead in the series but behind in the race with a penalty going round the final windward mark.  Getting rid of a penalty on the final leg is never easy especially against a team like the French.  We managed to get back into the lead making sure that the French were ‘hooked’ to windward of us, this meant we were able to sail them up the course allowing us to get our penalty in, set the spinnaker and finish ahead giving us our place in the finals.  The finals were against another two times World Champion, Sally Barkow from the USA.  Once again the racing was very close.  Each match finished with the boats no more that 2 boat lengths apart, in the final race we managed to give Sally and her team a Penalty pre start allowing us to have our best start of the week 2 lengths ahead of her allowing us to extend and finish the event as World Champions!

We have recently returned back from a cross country skiing camp in Font Romeu in the Pyrenees, along with our physiologist, physiotherapist and 10 other sailors.  Whilst the UK had lots of snow, we unfortunately didn’t have enough to go cross country skiing so did 3 days of 5 hour hikes as well as a lot of indoor games and swimming.  It was a fantastic week for our fitness as well as being good fun despite the blisters.  After our various delays in Barcelona airport due to the snow in the UK we all went to Birmingham for the Sports Personality of the Year Awards.  Being around so many talented athletes was an amazing experience and very inspirational. It was also a great party to finish the year with!

Now we have a couple of weeks off over Christmas before beginning 2011 with a visit to the boat show where Annie and Lucy will be doing talks on the 8^th and 9^th. Then we will be back out to Miami to start the 2011 World Cup Series and into some training before the main events begin. Our aim for 2011 is to gain qualification for the Olympics. We’re on track so far and we’ll do everything we can to stay there!

Thank you for all your support this year, it means a great deal to us.  We hope your had a Merry Christmas and have a very Happy and Successful New Year!

From

The GBR Match Race Girls.

Our start was looking good until a slight misjudgement by me meant we had to tack and not take the full bias off the line. We gained all the way upwind and ended up giving Anna a penalty but not being in a particularly good position. With a really close downwind Anna was able to take her penalty and still come out ahead. Despite pushing hard the whole way round and after countless tacks and gybes we were unable to pass and finished half a length behind to lose 3–2 down and placing us into the 5th–8th play-off… gutted!

Having sailed so well today and come back when it was all against us it is a disappointing end to our regatta. In the two races to decide places 5th–8th we sailed well and finished both ahead by some margin, but unfortunately we were fighting for the wrong places by then!

The semi finals followed our quarters and tomorrow Leroy (FRA) will race Souter (AUS) in the final and the petite final will be Groeneveld (NED) against Tunnicliffe (USA).

Overall in terms of how we have been sailing we are very pleased, however unfortunately this time the result has not represented that and at the end of the day that’s what counts but there is plenty to take away from the regatta, reflect and improve on, so that in 2 years time we are fighting for the medals!

Thanks for the support, Lucy x