Biggest on the bay

In Palma James Boyd and Toby Heppell speak to RYA Olympic Manager Stephen Park

Take a stroll around the various sailing bases for the Princess Sofia Regatta in Palma and you will see Skandia Team GBR branding on hundreds of pieces of equipment and people: 185 sails, 52 boats, 13 RIBs, 7 vans; 78 sailors and 25 support staff to be precise.

Seeing the size of this powerful army of red, white and blue medal grabbers, the depth and experience of the personnel it is not hard to see why Team GBR has been the most successful sailing nation at the last two Olympic Games and remains not only the envy of other national sailing associations around the world but also other non-sailing sports associations within the UK.

Team GBR’s presence the Princess Sofia exceeds that of every other sailing nation and is sizable to the extent that one could be forgiven for thinking that it was an ISAF Grade One (it is in fact Grade 2 - ISAF rules only allow three such regattas per continent, per year: Hyeres, Kiel and Holland Regatta). The RYA will be bringing an equally large squad in terms of both sailors and shoreside personnel to other major events this year, in particular Hyeres. This latter regatta will also be the first outing for the team’s brand new corporate hospitality vehicle.

Bringing a team of this size to events is certainly nothing new, says the man running the show - RYA Olympic Manager, Stephen Park - but there has been an increase in numbers this year as the team has grown and as for example British Olympians have returned to their respective classes following time away post-Athens. “We had quite a big presence here last year, but of course now things are really beginning to heat up into 2006-7 in terms of the maturity of the various programs programs and we are trying to press on with our development squad programs," Park maintains.

The size and depth of Skandia Team GBR is one of the major factors of its success. The RYA recognises this and does the best it can to nurture young talent up to an Olympic level. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the Olympic Development Squad. “One of the advantages of having the depth in numbers that we have is that we are able to train our development sailors next to our performance squad members. This means they have a clear yardstick of how far they have to go and how far they have come,” says Park. But, he adds, it is still necessary for them to come to Olympic class regattas such as the Princess Sofia to measure up against international competition.

Hence the Princess Sophia Regatta continues to grow in stature not only as the first proper European Olympic event of the season, but also an exercise in clocking in with the opposition. It is for example an opportunity for those who took part in the RYA’s training camps in Weymouth and Hayling Island over the winter to see how well they have progressed. “For those that didn’t go to Miami in January, which is the majority of our Olympic Development Squad guys, this is the first real test event of the season,” explains Park.

Palma is also increasingly being used by teams, in addition to Skandia Team GBR, as an off-season training base. Majorca has the advantage of being more clement than northern Europe in the spring - it is also not too crowded and is very accessible with numerous cheap flights there and ferries from the mainland.


Other teams

While Skandia Team GBR are at present the benchmark Olympic sailing team, they are no longer alone in increasing in size and professional attitude. “Times have changed significantly in the last eight years,” Park comments. “Very few sailors here these days are not professional. Those teams that have not been putting on a professional show and therefore not getting the results that they wanted are making big changes in their programs and are turning up with a big presence,"

Of the teams who seem to have made significant differences, Park points out the Germans who have been doing a lot of work to try and focus their team [it is believed for example that all their coaching pre-Beijing is to take place in one place only - Warnemeunde] and they have good sponsorship. Meanwhile the Dutch have got a very impressive program. He also believes that the Australians and the New Zealanders have progressed, both having made formal announcements of their sailing teams in recent weeks. On top of these four teams the French are attending events in large numbers and significantly upping their game, as are the Spanish.


Funding

Central to the success of Skandia Team GBR is the funding they receive from a variety of different sources. Primarily money comes to the team from the National Lottery and though rumours are abound that ticket sales have on the decline Park says that this is no longer the case. “My information is that statistics for lottery ticket sales are actually on a slight rise. The sales of lottery 2012 tickets have been very well received by the public which is, or course, good news."

The way National Lottery funds are allocated by UK Sport is based on three different factors. Primarily it is down to the number of medals that any given team wins. In addition to this it is based on a national association’s forecast for future success and finally UK Sport’s perception of how attainable those goals are. “They have a formula that generates the money and that is giving us a little more money this cycle than last cycle,” says Park.

More revenue is expected as part of the additional £2-3 million the Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown has recently allocated to sport, some of which, it is expected, will go to sailing.

For this cycle Park has worked very hard with Leslie Ryan and the company Capitalise to develop their corporate sponsorship program. “Obviously we have Skandia but we also have Group Four, Gul, Alfred McAlpine and Accenture as key sponsors and clearly that has bought in another chunk of money,” says Park, who is particularly proud of bringing the management consultancy Accenture on board as impressively their only other sports sponsorships are if Tiger Wood and the Williams Formula One team.

Park confirms that the operating costs of running Skandia Team GBR have not got any less compared to previous Olympics and any short fall is made up by UK Sport and by corporate sponsorship.

Given much of their funding comes from a public source Skandia Team GBR are keen to ensure that all of the money that they invest will see an acceptable return in terms of success. “If anybody stopped me in the street and said ‘I bought a lottery ticket yesterday or I work for Skandia what are you doing with our money?’ I want to be able to look them straight in the eye and say for every penny you have invested we are seeing a return and that absolutely nothing is getting frittered away,” he comments.


Evolution

Although the Skandia Team GBR squad has increased significantly in both size and depth there is no great desire for radical development. The Team has shown incredible success on the World, European and Olympic stage and 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it'. To use another cliche, Park says their approach is one of evolution not revolution. “I am conscious that we just want to slowly evolve and by making a few things a little bit better in each area, we are just trying to continue to raise the bar,” he says.


Absent members

Although many top Olympians have come back in recent months to full time Olympic sailing, there are still the elite of the elite Skandia Team GBR sailors notable for their absence. Shirley Robertson is obviously taking time away from Olympic sailing this year in order to have twins. In addition to this Ben Ainslie and Iain Percy are both involved in full time America’s Cup campaigns. Although they are not focusing on Olympic sailing currently, and will not do so fully until the America’s Cup draws to a close in the first part of 2007 they are both still an important part of the Team GBR. “With Ben having won the Finn Gold cup in four successive years he obviously knows what he needs to do to deliver. Even though he is not sailing and people have not seen him much on the Olympic circuit there is no doubt that when you speak to Finn sailors in the boat park and ask them who they think it is they have to beat they will still say Ben Ainslie even though he is not there,” explains Park.

It is a similar situation with Percy, who with his crew Stevie Mitchell has medalled at the last three Star World championships. Park is concerned not just with this America’s Cup but with the timing of the next one, which could be in 2010 or even 2012. If the event is too close to the Olympics sailors could see themselves having to make a very difficult choice indeed. As it is this time around the event finishes just before the Cascais World Sailing Games gets underway and should give our sailors a chance to get back into their boats and go for a medal at the Games.


Selection process

Although Park says that Ainslie and Percy will have finished their America's Cup campaigns in time for them to qualify to sail for Britain at the Olympics he remains tight lipped about Team GBR’s qualification progress and exactly the events which will count. “We specifically don’t publish our trials process publicly, because we don’t think it is relevant to anyone who is not trying to go to the Olympic Games. I can tell you we won’t be selecting anyone before 1 September 2007 and key events - World Championships, the pre-Olympic Championship etc will go part of the way to make up the selection process, but there are a number of different routes to get selected,” he explains. Although this information has not been released publicly the sailors in Team GBR were given the information at the beginning of this week.

Park also points out the system for selection is not just down to specific regattas they give the sailors and they will often use a trials system if there is more than one team or sailor which has achieved good enough results to qualify. “We just want to make sure that we are doing due diligence because clearly we have an obligation to the sailors to do that and we have an obligation to the British public to do that to make sure we make sure we select the best possible team and selecting the team I think we have been fairly successful at to date.”

Although this may seem reasonably obvious, the RYA have to be careful in terms of what they are and are not obliged to do. “Some countries have had real issues with their selection process. US Sailing is in a difficult position because they have some legal restrictions on how they select which we don’t have in the UK. My understanding is; there is a requirement for them to have a first past the post system, that results in them in having a single regatta, winner takes all approach,” explains Park. There have also been some reasonably well publicised difficulties in other countries. While the Australians selectors ended up in court.

The selection process is unlikely to get any less controversial as sailing becomes ever more professional. Now when people are being selected, or not, it is not just ambitions that are at stake, it is lives and livelihoods. Additionally when funding is based primarily on Olympic performance the selection of Olympians not only determines their future but also the future of Skandia Team GBR as a whole.


Coaching

Noticable about Skandia Team GBR over other national sailing team is how little they use overseas coaches for their Olympic program. Park does not discount using foreign coaches, but says that at the same time they are attempting to try and invest in British grown talent on every level of the Olympics. “As coaching is developing as a career it is about taking those coaches and giving them the input to make them truly world class. That is an on-going development as with the sailors we are trying to move the coaches on as well,” Park comments. “Alan Olive works hard at that at the RYA and we are looking hard to do more in that –invest in the coaches to develop them and as coaching is developing as a career it is about taking those coaches and give them the input to make them truly world class. That is an on-going development as with the sailors we are trying to move the coaches on as well.

Skandia Team GBR is clearly still very much at the top of the Olympic sailing world and is continuing to evolve its campaign to ensure they stay there. But other countries are now beginning to catch up and it would seem to be only a matter of time before every country is fielding a similarly large team. For the near future at least their position is looking secure.

Team GBR sailors at Princess Sofia:

Ed Wright	Finn
Matt Howard	Finn
Mark Andrews	Finn
Ed Greig	Finn
Laura Baldwin	Radial
Lizzie Vickers	Radial
Andrea Brewster	Radial
Alison Young	Radial
Penny Clark	Radial
Charlotte Dobson	Radial
Stephen Powell	Laser
Paul Goodison	Laser
Mark Powell	Laser
Charles Ballie Strong	Laser
Nick Thompson	Laser
Giles Scott	Laser
Luke Breen Turner	Laser
Nick Rogers &	470 M
Joe Glanfield	470 M
Nic Asher &	470 M
Elliott Willis	470 M
Callum McDonald &	470 M
Matt Day	470 M
Jonny McGovern &	470 M
Tom Mapplebeck	470 M
Luke Patience &	470 M
Chris Grube	470 M
Tom Mallindine &	470 M
James Clark	470 M
John Gimson	470 M
Stuart Bithell	470 M
Christina Bassadone &	470 W
Saskia Clark	470 W
Pippa Wilson &	470 W
Sheena Craig	470 W
Chris Draper &	49er
Simon Hiscocks	49er
Stevie Morrison &	49er
Ben Rhodes	49er
John Pink &	49er
Alex Hopson	49er
Paul Campbell James &	49er
Mark Asquith	49er
Ian Martin &	49er
Ben McGrane	49er
Justin Visser &	49er
Simon Wheeler	49er
Tristan Jaques &	49er
Alain Sign	49er
Dave Evans &	49er
Rick Peacock	49er
Sarah Ayton &	Yngling
Victoria Rawlinson	Yngling
Sarah Webb	Yngling
	Yngling
Annie Lush	Yngling
Lucy MacGregor	Yngling
Gemma Farrell &	Yngling
Rachel Howe	Yngling
Rachel Larman	Yngling
Leigh McMillan &	Tornado
Will Howden	Tornado
Rob Wilson &	Tornado
Mark Bulkeley	Tornado
Andy Walsh &	Tornado
Ed Barney	Tornado
Nick Dempsey	RSX M
Leo McCallin	RSX M
Hugh Sims Williams	RSX M
Bryony Shaw	RSX W
Lucy Horwood	RSX W
Christine Johnson	RSX W

Support staff:

Stephen Park	Olympic Manager
Barrie Edgington	ODS Manager
Lindsey Bell	Media
Jez Fanstone	Finn Coach
Ian Clingan	Radial Coach
Chris Gowers	Laser Coach
Peter Walker	Laser Coach
Tom Saunt	470 Coach
Adam Bowers	470 Coach
Ian Barker	Tornado Coach
Harvey Hillary	49er Coach
Adam May	49er Coach
Mark Nicholls	Yngling Coach
Helen Cartwright	RSX Coach
Fiona Campbell	Met
Pete Cunningham	Physiologist
Chris McLeod	S&C
Adrain Campbell	Physiologist
Chris Gordon	Physio
Alan Watson	Physio
Peter Bentley	Technical
Ian Maynard	Psychology
Steve Evans	Technical
Ben Chell	Psychology
Toby Fairgrieve	ACS