Reflections on the London Olympics

I know that this is really not about our adventures with Sarah G or our plans but it has been fascinating to watch the Olympic sailing events. When I was a teenager I wanted to get into dinghy racing but various things including a total lack of dinghy racing in my home town ruled it out. I was however a keen follower of Rodney Pattinson and had dreams of entering the Olympics Flying Dutchman

I had been very cynical about the London Olympics but have had to admit to having to eat humble pie on that. We did even have a go at getting tickets for Weymouth but the Locog ticketing system defeated us.

Now, it is even on television though as Ben Ainslie's chances seem to be fading for gold and Brits the BBCs traditional antipathy to sailing is reasserting itself and there is little coverage. The television coverage has also been a bit of a revalation. The boats must be carrying transponders as they are able to show the relative positions of the boat using computer animation.

Personally, I will be cheering for Saskia Clarke and Hannah Mills in the Womens 470 and Ian Percy and Andrew Simpson in the Star class.

The great Paul Elvestrǿm claimed accurately that the sailors were some of the toughest athletes in the olympics. They have to spend hours concentrating very hard and making numerous tactical decisions while at the same time using all their muscles to hold the boat in perfect trim for maximum speed.

I wish all the competitors well in Weymouth while acknowledging that I doubt I would ever have had the mental toughness to pursue racing at that level. Our gentle cruising is much more suited to my essentially lazy character!