Amanda Clark and Sarah Chin's Olympic campaign for 2012

by . on 9 Apr 2010 After a 15-month hiatus following a 12th place finish in the 2008 Beijing Olympics, Amanda Clark and Sarah Chin had a very exciting kick-off to 2010. They spent most of January in Coconut Grove, Florida training. They also competed in two events; 470 North Americans and the Rolex Miami Olympic Classes Regatta. They then moved over to Europe to kick of the spring season in Spain at the Princess Sofia Trophy Olympic Classes Regatta.

Their first event back was the 470 North American Championships 2010, hosted by the Miami Yacht Club. Their goal for this event was to get back into the boat and find a comfort level going around marks with other boats. Their first day of racing in over a year wasn't the easiest, forecasters predicted 20-25 knots, and with a 41-boat fleet, of both men and womens teams, they were nervous to say the least.

However, their upwind speed in the big breezes was on par with the top teams and they finished 1, 1, 2 for the day in the women's fleet. The rest of the regatta saw more mixed conditions, including three races on the final day in a very shifty Northerly. Despite a few inconsistent finishes, they held on to claim the title of North American Champions!

'We knew we needed a solid week of training after the NA’s to prepare for the main event. The Rolex Miami OCR, an ISAF World Cup Event. The fleet would be much deeper, containing an Olympic Gold Medalist, Silver Medalist and Bronze Medalist. The current and previous years World Champions and most of the top ten ranked teams in the World. An additional dose of pressure was our goal to qualify for the 2010 US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics, only possible with a podium finish at the event,' said Clark and Chin in a recent newsletter.

After the first three races, two points separated the top seven boats, showing the fleet's depth. They were right in the mix, but out of the top three with finishes of 7, 5, 2. Not a bad start, but they knew that they needed more to get onto the podium. On the second day of racing they tapped into the shifty, light/medium conditions well and posted a 1, 3, 1 which moved them to first overall and gave them the yellow jersey. With similar conditions greeting them the following day, they hoped for another good performance; however, a few unlucky shifts, a few missed opportunities and a botched start were ingredients for a frustrating day. Still, they ended the day in second overall, wearing the blue jersey. The final day of fleet racing before the medal racing, involved a slightly different strategy as the top three boats had separated from the rest of the fleet. By this time, they were essentially racing a select group of boats. Team Denmark sailed a fantastic day, taking first place overall. The French edged them out just enough to take over second and so they found themselves bumped into third. Only two points separated the top three. So everything came down to the final day, the Medal Race Day.

Medal Race Day
Clark and Chin began Medal Race Day wearing the third place, red jerseys. All they needed to do to win was to beat France and Denmark. Denmark had a rough time getting off the start line. Which meant that although they couldn't relax and forget about them, they could now put all of their efforts into catching the French. By the leeward gate, thanks to great boat speed downwind, they not only managed to catch the French, but pulled ahead of them by a boat length. A lead they increased by another boat length as they got to the second windward mark.

And so, they had finally done it. They won the regatta; they managed to wear all three jerseys over the course of the three day race.

'We are very excited and proud to win an event like the Rolex Miami OCR. It was a fantastic way to get back into the 470 and will provide an excellent platform from which to launch our program towards London, 2012. More importantly for us, we've earned a spot on the 2010 US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics!'

2010 Results:
Gold Medal at Rolex Miami OCR (leg 2 of ISAF World Cup)
2010 North American Champions
Members of 2010 US Sailing Team AlphaGraphics
8th Place, 2010 Princess Sofia Trophy- Palma de Majorca, Spain (leg 3 of ISAF World Cup)
4th Place in Current ISAF World Cup Standings

For more information on TeamGOSAIL, please visit: www.teamgosail.org