Austria's Gold Tornado team soft on Qingdao

by www.rte.ie on 7 Aug 2008 Austria's double Olympic Tornado gold medallists Roman Hagara and Hans Peter Steinacher do not consider themselves favourites to make it a hat-trick of titles. Hagara, 42, and Steinacher, 39, have won the last two Olympic regattas in their multi-hull Tornado, but head into the Beijing Games sitting a lowly 13th in the world rankings.

The duo are renowned light wind specialists and should find conditions in Qingdao to their liking, but Hagara said their preparations had not been plain sailing.

'Conditions should be an advantage but all Tornados are on the same level right now. We are not the favourites but in the best case we can race for a medal,' he said.

'We are ready to go but our sails are not that fast right now. I think our set-up in 2000 and 2004 was better. We had problems with qualifying for the Games in 2007 (at the world championships in Portugal).

'So we had to qualify in New Zealand in February. It was not easy for us and New Zealand was a heavy-wind area.'

The Austrians dominated to win their first gold in Sydney, triumphing with two races to spare.

'The most special was Sydney. Crossing the finish line, the prize-giving in front of the Opera House... We will never forget it,' recalled Hagara.

It was much closer affair four years ago in Athens. Leading by just three points going into the final race, they held off Americans John Lovell and Charlie Ogletree to win successive golds.

Despite playing down their chances in Qingdao, Hagara said their previous Olympic success meant they were under no pressure.

'That's our big advantage,' he said. 'If you have won it twice you do not feel any pressure.'

The Beijing Games will be the last for the Tornado class after it was left out of the London 2012 schedule following a request by the International Olympic Committee for the ISAF to reduce the number of events by one to 10.

'Tornado Sailing is the fastest and most spectacular Olympic sailing class. One sentence explains everything and nobody can really understand it,' said Hagara.

http://www.rte.ie