2012 Olympic venue

We speak to WNPSA Chief Executive about how the planning is going

The Skandia Sail for Gold Regatta took place in Weymouth & Portland earlier this year and was the first real test of the 2012 Olympic sailing venue. But despite featuring many of the same hardware and sailors, the Weymouth & Portland Sailing Academy will taken on a substantially different look come the Games themselves.

Much of the detail has yet to be finalised. Following Sail For Gold, the London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (LOCOG – where the familiar face of Rob Andrew is in charge of the sailing side) have been looking at ways the venue and the regatta can be developed. This will be an on-going process continuing with Sail for Gold in 2010 and the Olympic test event in 2011. It will be LOCOG who have the final say on this.

Perhaps the fundamental test was that at Skandia Sail for Gold the venue seemed full, but not overcrowded - and that was with 700+ competitors compared to the 380 competitors and 250 competing boats that will reside there for the Games (numbers are expected to swell to around the 1000 mark for Sail For Gold in 2010 and the 2011 Test Event). While there may be substantially less competitors in 2012, John Tweed, Chief Executive of the Weymouth and Portland Sailing Academy, reckons that for the Games, between competitors, their support staff, media, IOC, etc there could be as many as 2000 people milling around.

This summer, the WNPSA was heralded as the first facility to be competed for the 2012 Games. While the building is there and slipways and moles compete, come 2012 there will be many more temporary structures erected around the main building - these are not permanent structures due to the sustainability aspect of the 2012 Olympic specification, ie no buildings erected that won’t be used post-2012. Final work has been going on at adjoining Portland Marina, where the marina buildings are expected to house the International Olympic Committee staff and media during the Games. Meanwhile work is continuing into 2010 to level the area behind the WNPSA where there were originally oil tanks belonging to the Royal Navy.

"The car park and the surrounding area - we need a lot of space for containers and satellite trucks and all the paraphernalia that goes with that," says John Tweed.

Prior to the Games, Portland Marina itself is to be emptied and boats belonging to permanent berth holders remaining in there will be ‘locked up’ for the duration of the event. "We have plenty of capacity for storing the competitive dinghies, but the ISAF spec is that you need 380 odd marina berths," states Tweed. "We have 125 [off the WNPSA], so we will be using 250 from the marina as well. There are something like 200 RIBs. In China the armada of RIBS was incredible..."

One of the issues to have come out of Sail for Gold was the timing of the match racing, where there at present seems to be even greater pressure to pack races into the allotted time frame than there is for the fleet racing. With northeasterly breeze blowing all week, instead of the prevailing westerlies, they also discovered what happens if the wind doesn’t behave as it is supposed to. In a northeasterly Weymouth Bay can get extremely lumpy which is less the case in westerlies, save for the outer courses.

The course areas are still to be finalised, but it seems most likely that the sailboards and the subsequent Paralympic regatta will take place within Portland Harbour itself while the medal races are likely be held off Newton’s Cove - between Weymouth town and Portland Harbour’s northern breakwater. During Sail For Gold the women’s match racing was held off Newton’s Cove for the first couple of days, but John Tweed observes that in the northeasterlies it was a bit lumpy in there and so wasn’t ideal.

Significantly while the regatta will be based out of the WNPSA, from a public perspective the focus will be entire on Weymouth town itself, where the present thinking is that there may be two ticketed areas - Newton’s Cove and on Weymouth beach.

According to John Tweed, the WNPSA, and the immediate area surrounding it, will be isolated from the public, solely accessible by competitors and support staff, IOC and the media, etc. One reason presumably is to keep the single lane road across the causeway open for the 14,000 or so people who live on Portland itself...

"There will be two big screens there with live action from the water," says Tweed of the public viewing areas. "And when there is nothing going on on with the sailing, they’ll be showing the final of the 400m from London, etc - we want to create an Olympic carnival for the whole two weeks."

Back at the WNPSA, the academy building itself will be solely the domain of the competitors, although the present plan is that there will be a corridor leading from Portland Marina to the WNPSA slipways where there will be a ‘mix zone’ allowing press and competitors to mingle post racing.

In the coming months, Tweed says he is going to have to go shopping for more flag poles as part of Olympic tradition is that each of the nation must have its flag flying. "We will need a lot more flag poles around the place. I keep plugging away that the experience for the athletes should be the same if they are competing in Weymouth as if they are competing in London. So we should have an Olympic torch."

This also includes having the medal ceremonies accessible to the public - which means presumably holding them in Weymouth somewhere. Tweed says that LOGOG's Rob Andrews is fully in favour of this idea.

While there was discussion about all the competitors staying on a hotel ship moored within Portland Marina - and Tweed confirms that this is the still the fall back position - he says that this hasn’t proved popular with the athletes, so LOCOG is looking at alternatives. "Hopefully it will be a land-based option. They need to make sure they can get a secure area where they can get all of the competitors with sufficient accommodation. There are one or two possibilities. Commercial negotiations are still going on." Of course the RYA and the British sailors are okay as their new accommodation block within walking distance of WNPSA is at present just in the process of being finished.

A bigger headache for COLOG and Weymouth town is anticipating how many spectators are likely to pitch up. With the Games taking place at the beginning of August, right bang in the middle of the holiday season, the town is likely to be at capacity in any case...

"If Ben [Ainslie] is on the verge of getting his fourth successful Gold medal there could be a lot of people who want to see that," warns Tweed. Weymouth hold an annual carnival and typically 100,000 show up to this, so it could be heaving.

Then there is the problem of where everyone will stay. "One of the considerable challenges for Weymouth is the amount of accommodation and the standard of accommodation, because most of the available accommodation in Weymouth tends to be smaller guest houses and B&Bs. There are one or two hotel proposals. Unfortunately the 4 star hotel that opened on Portland has closed down. Hopefully that will be reopened and trading again by the time the Olympic comes around. There are a bunch of new hotels being built not very far away."

As to the WNPSA facility itself, at Sail for Gold it seemed to be working a treat. According to Tweed the original ‘Olympic specification’ from ISAF demanded a 150m width of slipway into deep water at all states of the tide. The original slipway at the WNPSA was only 35m and was also tidal but now they have twin slipways orientated at 90 degrees to each so that one is never in the lee, despite the wind direction.

Competitors were spoke to during Sail for Gold unanimously gave the new facility the thumbs up:

Italian Women’s 470 sailor Guilia Conti said: “It is really beautiful. You have already everything. Everything is perfectly organised. I have never sailed in England before. I really have to say that you know how to organise races.”

Australian Laser sailor Tom Slingsby: “It is perfect. I can’t think of anything I’d change. It is excellent.”

Croatian Finn sailor Ivan Kljakovic Gaspic: “You can see that they have put a lot of effort into making it really nice. The atmosphere is friendly. The people are really kind and friendly, so we feel great. Everyone is happy and thanks a lot to everyone who made such an effort. It is not easy to organise everything. I think this is the best place for Olympic sailing anywhere. It is really great.”

New Zealand 470 sailor Jo Aleh “This is pretty awesome. There is so much space. The Ramps are good.”

Dutch 470 crew Lobke Berkhout: “It is my first time. It is good. There is a lot of space, but not too big. Nice slipways – I like it. They should do everywhere like this.”

Finnish match racer Silja Lehtinen: “It is a great place. Keeping boats here and training from here is a bit expensive. Otherwise it is great – a cool place to sail. I was last here in 2006. It is fun that all the classes can be so close together.”

Meanwhile the WNPSA are currently trying to shed their image as a dinghy venue as they now have the facilities there from which to stage regattas for larger keelboats. This may be hampered by Weymouth and Portland themselves not exactly being Porto Fino, but the sailing from there is obviously world class if the wind behaves itself and with a little digging there are some more than adequate shoreside facilities, accommodation, pubs and restaurants.