Medal-less to top sailing nation in two years

Toby Heppell looks at the impressive turn-around in the Australian Olympic Sailing team

Ask almost any sailor to name of the top ranked sailing team in the world and they will, in all probability, automatically answer “Team GBR”. Recently, however, Skandia Team GBR have slipped on the ISAF world rankings and, despite taking the most medals at the last two Olympic Games and boasting a host of world champions, the team are now ranked down in lowly fifth position. So which, at present, is the ‘top sailing nation’? Australia.

Australia has long history of sailing, being the spiritual home of the skiff that is now so popular on the global dinghy scene. However, their history in terms of Olympic success has been limited, to put it mildly. The Australian Sailing Team walked away from the Athens Olympic Games in 2004 without a single medal to their name and, in 2006 - when they repeated this medal-less performance at the Olympic Test Event - they ranked an impressively poor 12th on the ISAF world ranking list. So how has this country gone from medal-less mediocrity to becoming top sailing nation on the planet and perhaps one of the biggest medal prospects at this years Olympics in the space of two short years?

The answer is wholesale change. This came about from Yachting Australia commissioning a review of their practices which they called the 'Gold Medal Plan,' designed to look at what needed to happen within the sailing establishment to sort Australia out as an Olympic sailing nation.

In essence this involved a large shake-up of the entire management system from top to bottom and the introduction of a new Olympic Director in the form of very successful businessman and average – in his words -Star sailor, Michael Jones (above) as Olympic Director. "I actually was not part of that review process," Jones explains. "They decided a new director who had a knowledge of sailing and business acumen be appointed to revamp both the processes and the organisation and leadership of the team. Effectively that is where I came in."

The shake-up, however, did not just stop with Jones’ appointment. Yachting Australia went for a complete overhaul of the old organisation. "Effectively we set up as a semi-autonomous body within Yachting Australia. We also said that we should go out as a corporate body to seek more funding and sponsorship than just through the Australian sports commission who were the primary funding agency at the top of the team."

This new 'semi-autonomous' body includes everything from the earliest youth sailing right through to the Olympic sailors at the very top of the tree and everything in between. This allows the team to gain a great deal of consistency throughout their sailing team.

Clearly with this all-encompassing body, along with being better geared up to accept the sponsorship dollar, the Australian Sailing Team are in many respects mirroring the highly successful Skandia Team GBR model. "As I was not involved in the review process, I cannot say for sure who they looked at. I am fairly sure they would have looked at all the other major teams in the world though," Jones comments. "I think they would look at teams that have done well in the past including Spain, France, Germany and knowing Team GBR had won the greatest amount of medals in the last two Olympics, it would be stupid for them not too have looked at them and said what are they doing right and what can we do to ‘de-petal that flower’."

While at first glance it does look as though the new Australian Sailing Team is essentially a carbon copy of the Skandia Team GBR model, on closer inspection there are a great many differences between the two approaches. Some of these come simply from a need to be different - Australia are several years behind with this large scale corporate model – others are based on differing ideas the Australians have about how the team should be run.

It is clear when talking to Jones that he has strong ideas about exactly what needs to be done with the sailing team and he is obviously keen to go to great lengths to ensure what is required. "I am not a huge believer in democracy," he explains. "I am a believer that we are here for one purpose and one purpose only: that is to produce results. To some degree that requires an amount of finesse because at times the athletes need protecting from themselves and at other times they need to be absolutely supported in order to achieve what they need to achieve."

Jones hold strong opinions about what needs to be done to create a successful team. He also seems very focussed and we do wonder if he might put a few of the athlete’s backs up as he makes major demands of them. Equally, there is no doubt he is incredibly passionate about launching the Australian Sailing Team on to a higher road, fighting for a position at the top of the international rankings. This commitment to improvement is demonstrated, in no small part, by an early commitment he made to the Australian Sailing Team. On his appointment as Olympic Director, Jones promised he would not take a salary for his role until he had secured three times that salary cost in sponsorship dollars. A cynic might say this speaks more of Jones' personal wealth than his commitment to Australian sailing, but in fairness he has since secured this extra
funding, which can only be a benefit to the athletes.

There remains a significant difference between Skandia Team GBR and the Australian Sailing Team in their respective sizes. "We have four full time coaches who are on salary and five admin staff, so we do run the thing pretty lean, considering we are running the youth programme, the development programme, and the Olympic Sailing Team too with that lean organization,” Jones continues. “Of course that requires that everyone works bloody hard and are motivated and they all are."

Of course this progression is all very well and good, and leading the ISAF rankings is an impressive feat, but much of these forward steps will mean nothing unless this success can be converted into results at the Olympics this year. Here, the Australians have the one same major problem as every other nation. "From the first time any of us went to Qingdao, which was the 470 Worlds in early 2006, the stories started to permeate through the team about how light it was going to be," Jones comments. "Then when we went there for the Test Event in 2006 we had a look at the forecast before we went and it was pretty apparent this was going to be an extremely light wind Olympics."

This observation of the conditions at the Olympic sailing venue in Qingdao could affect the Australians more than most teams. The country is well known for its strong sea breezes and many of its sailors are heavy wind specialists. Jones says they have been trying to prepare sailors for this in a variety of ways. Finding a venue in Australia that reflected the light winds of Qingdao is difficult, but , Jones says if you know when and where to go sailing, Australia can provide them. "The 470 guys have been training at 6 o'clock in the morning on Sydney Harbour to get the residual slop and crappy water and the light breezes," he explains. "The Star guys have been training up at Broken Bay which is the northern harbour in Pittwater. Again they train at six o'clock so there has been a lot of that."

In addition to this the team also have a very useful sponsor in the Oatley family’s resort at Hamilton Island and have utilised this venue for some training camps. "It is quite tidal up near the Whitsunday Islands. We have done a lot of sailing in close proximity to the resort where you can get light winds during the day and you can also get very strong tides."

Prior to his appointment Jones had for a long time been following the Australian Olympic Team and over the years has clearly made some firm decisions about what has needed to be done to achieve medals. Specifically, he seems obsessed with making sure the team are preparing for the Olympics as far out as possible. Last year the Australian Sailing Team were the first team in the world to officially select all of their representatives for the 2008 Olympics in October. Jones says this was done so the athletes could get their heads down and focus, as well as fully committing themselves both emotionally and financially to the Games.

There are also other areas where the team have made decisions regarding the Olympics extremely early. "It is not really a secret anymore that we hope the Star will be the last boat to have determined the actual equipment they will use at the Games by mid-April this year," Jones comments. "Most of the other classes have already shipped their kit to China so now all they are working on is individual racing skills and other programmes. In that respect we are running a very disciplined programme, which is very different to the way it has been done in the past, where people would say say, 'I am not sure which boat I want to take', which has been distracting."

So with all these changes and their recent success just - how well does Jones believe the team will get on this summer in China? "We get asked that question all the time, particularly with Australia being such a sport-mad country and with us having won 14 medals since the ISAF Worlds last year. We are definitely tracking pretty well at the moment looking at those results and there is a lot of expectation," he comments. "When we get asked that question I tend to say we would like to win medals and they say so how many? Ultimately, the answer I like to give is that in 2000 we won two gold a silver and a bronze at our home Olympics and that is the best we have ever done as a sailing nation. I would like to emulate or better that. That is the ultimate aim, but of course there are a few other countries out there that will stop us doing that."

So having raised the bar, the Australian Sailing Team look set to one of the big contenders at the Olympic Games this year. However Qingdao is going to be a very tough event and given the ‘challenging’ conditions there, it is not hard to imagine even the best teams walking away disappointed.