Rio 2016 - Elated Rickham and Birrell claim second SKUD18 bronze

by Imogen Stanley on 18 Sep 2016 Gracious Alexandra Rickham and Niki Birrell admitted they were “elated” after matching their London 2012 feats by taking SKUD18 bronze on the final day of the Rio 2016 Paralympic regatta today (Saturday 17 September).

The Brits entered the day still in with a shout for silver, trailing the Canadian duo John McRoberts and Jackie Gay by a single point.

But in a ding-dong battle around the racetrack, where the positions were changing hand throughout, McRoberts and Gay ultimately sailed over the line third in the race, four seconds ahead of the Brits in fourth, to take the silver medal.

Dan Fitzgibbon and Liesl Tesch (AUS) wrapped up gold with two races to spare yesterday. But with Monika Gibes and Piotr Cichocki (POL) lurking just four points off the medals in fourth spot before racing, and then taking line honours today, Rickham and Birrell couldn’t hide their delight at finishing on the podium again.

Rickham and Birrell’s medal, along with Helena Lucas’ bronze in the 2.4mR, means that the British Sailing Team has achieved its pre-Rio target of two medals.

Rickham said: “We feel relieved. It's been a long, very hard week. We came here to contest for the gold, but that slipped away really quite quickly, and we're just so happy to have got the medal.

“It was close to being silver but John and Jackie sailed a fabulous regatta and they really deserved that medal. We're just elated. It's great to be able to come away with another medal.”

Birrell continued: “To have two Paralympic medals is just surreal. They don't come easy and I'd like to thank everyone who has ever helped us in our SKUD programme. Thank you so, so much. Now I'm looking forward to going home and seeing my wife!

“Rio has been fantastic, we've really enjoyed it. To get all 11 races in is awesome. We came for gold but we're super happy with bronze because this week we've had to fight so hard in our boat for every meter and every position.”

As the Poles and Ryan Porteous and Maureen McKinnon (USA) rapidly raced to the front, the battle for the decisive positions was unfolding behind them with the British, Canadian, Australian and Italian boats involved in a four-way fight.

After two laps of the three had been completed, Rickham and Birrell held the advantage over McRoberts and Gay, with the Brits having the one boat between them they needed to win the silver medal.

But with that one boat being the Australians, who have dominated the class this week, Canada and Britain were left in a straight head-to-head to the finish line.

Rickham added: “It was a really stressful race. On the start line we were really concerned because we were really close to the line so we were a bit worried we were over and we wouldn't have known until the end.

“But we had good boat speed and Niki was making some really good calls. It was really difficult on the course, up and down with massive shifts at the top of the course underneath Sugarloaf Mountain so it was anybody's game.

“Behind the Poles there must have been positional changes five or six times so it was hard but we're really, really happy.”