Transendental meditation and the Laser

We speak to the man with the coolest name in Olympic sailing, American Brad Funk

On a sunny balcony in Palma, Spain casually glancing over his shoulder every so often to see if the queue for measurement was suitably short enough for him to join sat Brad Funk. Aside from having one of the grooviest names in sailing, Funk is one of the US' top Laser sailors who is aiming for the US spot at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

Funk is not new to the Olympic campaign scene; he competed in the American trials for the Olympics last time round and was pleased to achieve a third place following his being ranked fourth in the US. For Funk the Beijing cycle marks a much more realistic chance at an Olympic spot. One of the reasons for this is Mark Mendelblatt, the previous US Laser Olympian moving into the Star.

In addition Funk has been training hard with some of the top Laser sailors in the World, working in particular Swede Rasmus Myrgren. Among other things Myrgren showed Funk, who admits he finds it hard to bulk up, the importance of weight gain in the Laser and has been feeding him large bowls of pasta several times a day every day. He has also been working hard critiquing his downwind technique, and is hoping that all these improvements will stand him in good stead to get the spot to go to Qingqao.

Funk came to singlehanded racing early on starting out, as many top sailors do, in the Optimist class. It was here that he caught the bug for competitive racing, not only the actual sailing but also the scene you become involved in. “I went to four Worlds and four South American Championships and got to know some of the people on the sailing scene. I hung out with Chris Draper quite a bit back then for example,” he explains.

Funk subsequently made the progression into the Laser following his move up to high school. It was at this time that Mendelblatt and fellow Laser star Bret Davis took him under their wing and began to develop him into the sailor he is today. As well as Laser sailing Funk also sailed various dinghies at his college, the Old Dominion College in Virginia.

Unfortunately Funk is not naturally the right build for the Laser and has had to work hard over a period of ten years to be competitive in the class. He is now, finally, up to weight through a combination of gym work, pasta and a legal chemical called Creotin. “Creotin is a chemical found in meat. it works by holding water in your muscles,” he explains. “What that does is put your muscles in an anabolic state which would recover you faster. It does not allow your muscles to get dry so nutrients are constantly being supplied to them. It is pretty handy because it increases weight, strength and recovery.”

Besides a struggle with weight gain Funk’s Laser sailing career has had a major setback due to a hereditary problem with his shoulders. “The problem was that my shoulder kept dislocating itself when it was under load. Basically one of the ligaments was fused to another one of the ligaments so the space created allows the bone to just pop out of the socket,” he says. “It is totally fixed now by the best orthopaedic surgeon on the planet called James Anders." Anders has treated Michael Jordan, Dan Marino and many other top sports people in the US.

During the Northern hemisphere summer, the most competitive Olympic classes sailing is to be found in Europe, but this obviously proves costly for sailors coming from across the Atlantic. It is not cost effective to come over for just the one regatta so Funk is planning on spending a lot of time on the European continent this year. After Palma he will be heading to France and the Semaine Olympique Francaise in Hyeres, followed by the ISAF World Sailing Games in Austria at the end of May. Although all of this time outside of his home country may be expensive Funk seems completely unconcerned by such matters, in the fortunate position of having his financial affairs secure. “Doing the European circuit is reasonably easy for me now because I am an owner of four storage facilities. My father built 16 storage facilities because Americans just love stuff. Ten years ago it started to become a bigger business and between then and now it has really boomed so I am one of the owners of that. The storage business pretty much pays for my sailing like a big sponsor would."



Funk believes it would be possible for him to do the European circuit without the money he earns but it would be significantly more difficult and he is making some cost savings. Currently in a relationship with Anna Tunnicliffe, ranked third in the ISAF Laser Radial rankings, the two of them are sharing accommodation throughout Europe with mutual friend Lisa Ross, ranked fourth in the ISAF Laser Radial rankings.

Compared to the supreme support provided by UK Sport to Team GBR, Funk does not receive a lot of money from US Sailing toward his campaign costs. “Last season I did not really have any good results in Europe, except for the Radial Worlds where I got second. In the standard rigs where it matters I have not performed well enough so the level of money I am allotted will soon go down.” This is part of the reason for Funk spending so much time away in Europe this season to try and achieve some better results and also to race in big fleets against the European Laser sailors.

Main competition comes in several forms internationally but in the US there are realistically very few potential Olympians in the Laser. “Internationally I think that Maciej Grabowski, the Polish guy is pretty good. I have been training with him and got a chance to train with Paul Goodison for a couple of days in Miami who is also really good." He continues the list of who he rates: "Bernard Lutner from Canada, Gustavo Lima from Portugal and Diego Romero from Argentina all look like they are extremely quick. All of those guys are the people that I know have been going really well. My main home competition comes from Andrew Campbell, who is a bit of a rock star on the college sailing scene. He and I have been duking it out with each other for the last couple of years. He is going full time as soon as he has finished college in May. He and I will be travelling and helping each other, trying to build a stronger force of Americans."

Having started sailing the Laser at the age of 17, Funk has now been in the class for just over ten years. Considering his relative lack of success until recent years, his struggling with shoulder injuries and his weight we wondered if he had ever considered just packing it all in. “I love sailing the boat too much for that, the physical aspect of the Laser and the challenge that it provides given my size is just unbeatable. I even like hiking but then if you do not like to hike you won’t sail the Laser because your back and the rest of your body can give you a lot of pain sometimes." He adds that in the Olympic field and in the Laser specifically the improvements that you can make to your performance are always slight and he feels he is still making forward progress.

Hanging with him in Palma, Funk comes over as a laid back in extremis and we find out this is not just due to him coming from Florida, the sunshine state, the land of beach parties. Off the race course he is very into transcendental meditation. This, he explains, is all about letting more light into yourself which in turn allows you to vibrate faster thus reducing the amount of energy you waste. A slight problem with this spiritualism is that people can find it clashing quite severely with the competitive nature of dinghy racing. “Two other sailors I know were meditative but they left sailing because it was too competitive," confirms Funk. "Brett Davis who was Mark Mendelblatt’s main competition before he won the US trials and another Canadian guy I know."

So often these days we talk to sailors who tell us about how professional they are becoming and that the only way to win is to be the best prepared, most aggressive, most practiced sailor. Speaking to Funk it is clear that he only sails because he loves to do it, no one gives him a wage for it or a coach to help him improve. He just goes out and sails because that is what he wants to do. But this seemingly casual approach has been good for Funk. When we left him still sitting on the balcony waiting for the measurment queue to be a bit shorter he told us his aim for the Princess Sofia Regatta was to be in or around the top ten. In the end he finished seventh.