Indian Finn sailor battles the best

by Hindu Times & Sail-World.com on 27 Jul 2008 While countries like Britain, Australia, New Zealand, Holland, France, Spain and the USA are looking at their Olympic sailing team’s possible medal hauls, the second most populous country in the world, India will have just one sailing representative in Qingdao.

Indian Army Major Nachhatar Singh Johal, a 29 year old ex-Laser sailor from Punjab, sailed his first ever Finn Regatta, the Miami OCR in January 2007 but he missed the Olympic Finn class qualification by one place in the Sail Melbourne International Regatta, Australia in January 2008.

But when Germany chose not to send a Finn sailor Johal wasted no time in re-igniting his campaign. At the trials in Mumbai conducted by the Yachting Association of India (YAI) Johal beat Indian dinghy champion Nitin Mongia to become India sole Olympic sailor with a billion aspirations on his sturdy shoulders.

For Johal it was the cumulative perspiration of seven years that resulted in an Olympic berth. After participating in six international events and two world championships Johal had sailed and trained with the best Finn sailors in the world since his 2007 introduction to the class.

But qualifying was just the first simple hurdle, and a major challenge was to get adequate international exposure before August.

But unfortunately, by the time the trials were completed it was too late for Johal to move to Europe for training, and so he directly moved to China early July to train and acclimatise with conditions there.

Johal is making full use of his time in China and appeared quite cheery when he said, 'I am used to China and Chinese food now. All this would help me when the time comes.' In Qingdao, China, Johal faces a tough field of 26 sailors of whom 12 have already had some taste of the Olympic arena. Johal knows the picture is not at all rosy.

'Of my competitors, at least 18 have been placed in the top ten in major regattas, and 11 have picked up a medal in the past four years either at the Finn Gold Cup, European Championship or Qingdao regattas. In addition all except three of the top 20 in the world rankings will be in Qingdao. It could well prove to be one of the toughest Olympic Finn competitions of all time,' he said.

The Indian sailor is not promising the skies. He is aware being inexperienced and with least exposure at the highest level, expecting a medal would be too far-fetched. 'I am not expecting any miracles. I am rather going to use this opportunity to get used to the Olympic atmosphere and learn from the top guys as much as I can. I am hoping to put up few good performances and finish in top 10, ' he said.

However, a medal in the 2012 Olympics might be a more realistic goal and Johal says he is eyeing the yellow metal itself.

Johal’s 2009-12 plan to get on to the right track and is looking for sponsors.

The Indian sailor had hired Britain’s number 2 Finn sailor Ed Wright for 15 days in China to help him with the training. The Major received some help through the Federation for his training but that was not enough to cover the full cost and ultimately he had to chip in from his own resources. He said,

'I wanted to put up a good show, so am paying the price.' At the same time Johal is quick to thank the government for whatever help they gave. 'Without Federation support, I wouldn’t be here. I hope that Federation supports me from 2009 till 2012. To have a realistic chance of a medal, I need to do all the big events across the globe for minimum 3-4 yrs,' he said.