Nova Scotia's Danielle Dube racing towards Olympics

by Monty Mosher on 22 Apr 2012 Danielle Dube is home to rest for a few weeks before her final descent into the London 2012 Olympics.

And it will be a rapid descent into England.

The Glen Haven native has three major regattas in the Laser Radial class before she’ll line up in Weymouth in a bid to become an Olympic sailing champion.

The 25-year-old Dalhousie management graduate will be a first-time Olympian after taking the lone Canadian berth in Laser Radial this January at a regatta in Miami. She overcame Vancouver’s Isabella Bertold in the final race to become the top Canadian in the trials.

Dube will occupy the position held in the last Olympics by Halifax’s Lisa Ross.

Sailing out of the Royal Nova Scotia Yacht Squadron and the St. Margaret Sailing Club, she will start the Olympics at the opening ceremonies in London on July 27. She will depart for Weymouth, approximately 215 kilometres away, the following day with competition set to begin the day after.

'I definitely think about it,' she said this week after being reminded the Olympics are 100 days away. 'I guess the thing is I’ve never done this before so I don’t really know what to expect. So I spend more time thinking about my performance, about the actual sailing aspect of it, and not so much about the opening ceremonies and what that’s all going to be like. I’m just going to let that happen.'

Dube started sailing at the age of nine when a friend thought it would be fun.

'I got into it almost by accident and in the end she ended up stopping,' she said. 'But I continued on and getting into racing.'

She began her racing career in the Byte class and won a youth world title in 2004. When the Olympic class for women became the Laser Radial in 2005, she made her move to the single-handed boat she sails today.

She has competed in Laser Radial world championships in Brazil, the U.S., Portugal, New Zealand, Japan and Australia.

She almost qualified for the Beijing Olympics in 2008. Three Canadian women, including Dube and Ross, achieved the Olympic qualification standard at the world championships in 2007 in Portugal, but Ross eventually earned the spot for China.

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