ISAF Worlds Santander – Finn favourite determined to nail selection

by Rob Kothe and the Sail-World Team on 7 Sep 2014 The 2011 Finn World Champion Giles Scott famously missed out on selection for the British Sailing Team and Ben Ainslie went on to write history with his fourth Gold medal. For this quadrennium Giles Scott is determined not to lose Olympic selection and he is currently on a hot streak having won the last six events, all the events he has sailed in this year, and many of them quite easily. We talked today to Giles about 2011-2012 and lessons learned and his plans going forward.

Still look back at 2012?

I wouldn’t say I dwell on it. I certainly look back on it and have learned a lot of things and generated a lot of drive from it. A lot of lessons. From my point of view where I went wrong is by the time the Games came around I was in a very good place to be in for winning a Gold medal but the fact of the matter is I was too late and Ben beat me to qualifications fair and square.

I have got no issue to that because I have only got myself to blame. Everything was done fairly as far as I am concerned. The only thing I can look back to is I make sure I don’t let that happen again and take as much away from it as I can which I feel as if I have been able to do and hope to continue to do.

Peaking at the right time?

Yes it is about peaking at the right time. There is a little bit of that. As well as other things which are a bit more campaign related like just the level of investment I can put into it. The amount of expertise I didn’t get hold of leading up to the selctions. There is a lot of things in there that contributed. When are in a position going up against someone like Ben who is at the end of his Olympic career. He had done it all before four times and he knew that he wasn’t going to leave anything undone to make sure that he qualified and that was in every area of his campaign. It’s a big thing to be close to and learn from.

Determined that’s not going to happen to you again?

Yes absolutely. That’s the driving force behind it. As much as I love Olympic sailing the reason I am doing it is for an Olympic medal. I am trying to do my best to see that that happens. I have had one go and failed so I don’t want to fail again.

You are 6ft 5. Ben 6ft 1 and its evolved that downwind is really important these days.

Unlimited pumping comes in at 10 knots and that is a little bit of a game changer. Not a massive game changer but it just means the physicality of it comes in that little bit earlier and being longer is potentially an advantage. It doesn’t mean that a 6ft 1 Finn sailor couldn’t be just as quick or as good as a 6ft 7 Finn sailor.

Has your gym routine changed much in the last four or five years?

No not really. It’s much the same. It’s still been a very powerful boat and as long as you are able to manage that and it has probably been a bit more of a high end cardio difference in the training but all the normal strength and power stuff has stayed the same.

Lots of guys behind you. Who do you see as likely podium players in this regatta?

I wouldn’t to be so bold to say that they are behind me. There are a lot of guys. The French are going very well like Jonathan Lobert and Thomas Le Briton, the likes of Ivan Kljakovic Gaspic, Vasilij Zbogar is going very well as well, Ed Wright PJ Postama, Jonas Hoegh-Christensen is back for the worlds. He hasn’t done a lot of sailing but as I found out in 2012 having a fresh view on it is not always necessarily a bad thing and I am sure he will be there or thereabouts. There a quite a few guys that I think are clearly going to do well. If it is a light week as with most fleets it opens things up a lot.

Heavier conditions the boat handling comes through a lot?

Yes. It’s pretty fair to say if it is generally a breezy week it is more likely to see the people at the top that you would expect to be there.

Rio from a pollution point of view?

It’s something everyone keeps (half scaring) with. The racing we did inside the harbour was actually reasonable. There were a few plastic bags and a bit of grease and oil around but if they could get rid of the plastic bags on the race course I would be happy as Larry.

The most annoying thing from my point of view is from a purely racing point of view which is only one that I could get really collared on because I am no environmental expert but just as long as there is no debris on the water that could catch on foils and slow us down and make the racing a bit skewed then I am happy.

Worried about getting sick if you swallow water?

Apparently Coca Cola is the cure. Apparently if you swallow something dirty you just drink Coca Cola. It kills everything.

So we have Coke on the coach boat. We carry Coke and our medical guys have said that if you do swallow some of the dirty water get some Coke in because that will nuke it.

That’s an ad?

Yes. It’s either a good ad or a bad ad I don’t know.