World no1's perspective

Claire LeRoy talks to thedailysail about her plans now that the Elliott has been announced as the chosen weapon

One person overjoyed by ISAF’s decision to bring women’s match racing into the Olympic Games for 2012 is France’s Claire LeRoy, who has been at the top of ISAF Women’s match racing ranking forever it seems (in fact she has been No.1 since March 2005). 2008 has been a fine year for LeRoy and her team who won the ISAF Women’s Match Racing Worlds in New Zealand, and the two warm-up events before this, as well as the women’s division at the Match Cup Sweden. Their worst result was a third at the Rolex Osprey Cup.

LeRoy was in Madrid recently for the ISAF Annual Conference as an observer but also to give her input into the choice of boat for Women’s Match Racing in Weymouth in 2012. A match racing purist, which means that part of the challenge is to pitch up in an event and go racing in whatever the boat is, LeRoy says she ideally would have preferred the choice of equipment to have been delayed for as long as possible or even the choice of boat kept secret. She says “they think it is not possible because it is too complicated to do it in this way.”

As to the choice of the Elliott 6 over the other contenders such as the Laser SB3, LeRoy is happy. “This boat is okay because it is a boat for match racing and built for that in New Zealand. It was designed for three young men, so for women it should be okay, but it will be quite tough so they have tried to reduce sail to make it a better boat for women.”

LeRoy is already well versed in the Elliott 6 as this was the boat in which this year’s Women’s Match Racing World Championship were conducted. “It is a fun boat, like a dinghy, because you hike. You have a lot of manoeuvres, and the helm does a lot of tings like in a 470 - put the spinnaker up and I think we can take spinnaker sheet too. It will change the game because it is not usual to do that - normally you are focussed on the helming and that’s all. It is a long time since I’ve done that!”

While one can imagine the top countries snapping up Elliott 6s in pairs the moment they are available, LeRoy is still coming to terms with the necessity of this. “You can buy the boat but it is not an obligation because all the races will stay with the boats that they have so it will not change the circuit, but it will change for the Olympics because of the choice of the boat. I think it won’t be the goal of everyone to buy a boat this year.”

So for LeRoy, at this stage at least, it will be business as usual for her in 2009 as she sets out to defend her World Championship title in Lysekil at the end of July. At the moment she imagines that she will begin her Olympic training only after this, while her competition, who perhaps don’t have her profound skill and experience, will spend this year gaining match racing knowledge.



“The World Championship next year will be in DS37s, so I think I will be focussed on that with my team and during the year we will get a boat, but it will not be the objective for this year.” However after this she will compete at the Skandia Sail For Gold Regatta in Weymouth mid-September.

So now that match racing is an Olympic discipline how will she change her campaign? While LeRoy is the World Champion and tops the ISAF ranking, she only sails part time and holds down a regular job, although one which at present allows her to take 80 days off each year to go sailing. In 2009 she doesn’t think this will change, however she admits that she is studying the campaigns from other countries, in particular that of Skandia Team GBR to see what they did right. “It is really new for me, so I have to take all the ideas of everyone and try to make my project real and try to combine my actual life with this objective.”

As to her crew, LeRoy says there will be no changes for 2009. She has her squad who she draws from according to the number of crew required for each regatta where their average weight must typically be 68kg. Otherwise strength is vital for trimming, but otherwise their shape doesn’t matter she says. However with the Elliott 6 being a hiking boat this is likely to change and LeRoy reckons tall girls will prove more effective. Luckily she has two matching this description in her squad already.

Right now, LeRoy is back at her job and won’t be sailing again until the new year. Will she be back to defend her title on Queen Mary in January again? She says she’d like to but at present the one time JPMorgan Winter Challenge is without a sponsor… If this doesn’t come to pass then she may go Rolex Miami OCR at the end of January where they will hold a women’s match race event in Laser SB3s.

Obviously a significant change for women’s match racing teams is that there will in theory be many more Olympic Classes events they can compete in over and above the ones on the present match racing circuit. However for 2009 at least LeRoy reckons she will continue doing 10-12 events as she has for the past three years.

It will be fascinating to see how LeRoy fairs with the influx of new women’s match racers we will presumably see next season, as this will no doubt include many top Olympic names, who are certain to raise the bar in women’s match racing very rapidly.