Tracey Covell talks to madforsailing

A hard working GP manages to find time for sailing and a baby daughter.

Tracey Covell (nee Jordan) is a true sailing enthusiast. In the late 1980's she campaigned a 470, narrowly missing out on selection for the British Olympic Team for The Games in Korea. While at Medical School in the early 1990's she continued to search for Olympic glory, this time in the Europe Class. Rather than simply giving up sailing at the end of her Olympic dream, Tracey carried on sailing, first in a Laser 5000 and more recently in an RS800.
Now married to Olympic Silver medallist and GBR Challenge crew, Mark Covell she has a two-year-old daughter, Emily. Tending to the sick and the lame as a GP in Emsworth during the week, she continues to sail nearly every weekend.

Peter Bentley asked the questions at a recent RS Open Meeting.

Tracey you’ve been doing this nearly as long as I have. What on earth keeps you at it?

Because I love it. It’s great its nice to do something at the weekends that totally takes your mind off any stresses you may have at work. When you go racing and you don’t think about anything else at all apart from the race. It’s just like having a break from being on the treadmill.

When I first knew you, you were doing the whole Olympic thing. How different is what you’re doing now from what you were doing then?

Totally different. This is a lot more fun. I got tired of sailing an all women’s classes. It’s a lot more fun and a lot more friendly sailing in a mixed class and not being am Olympic class its far less intense. It's nice that. I haven’t got time to practice now and I know we can still hope to be reasonably successful without having to practice all the time. In Olympic class you have to practice all the time to have any hope of being mid fleet never mind of being successful.

You did Olympic campaigns in the 470 and then in the Europe and didn’t quite crack it on either occasion. Is it a disappointment to you that you didn’t win a medal in the Olympics?

Yes I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t but I don’t regret doing it. I mean I thoroughly enjoyed doing it despite what I said earlier about this being more fun and I learned lots. And I met Mark which was great. I didn’t go to the Olympics in Barcelona and I was gutted. I felt very disappointed but the great thing was I met Mark towards the end of that campaign and you know that’s helped compensate.

You’ve got a little baby daughter now and you’ve got a husband who’s fully involved in the Americas Cup campaign and you’re working as a GP and yet you somehow manage to find time go reasonably serious club sailing. How on earth do fit it all in?

You have to be very organised and have great grandparents. The great thing about the America's Cup is that Mark is generally only at work and sailing during the week. The majority of weekends he doesn’t have to go in which is very different to when he was doing Olympic campaign. I hardly sailed when he was doing The Games because we didn’t have any child-care at the weekends. Then that was really difficult. I found that very hard. I really missed sailing because it's such a stress reliever to go racing. Now it's great. We’ve got Mark off at the weekends and his mothers retired so she’s available at the weekends and my parents are around so it's easy.

What are you going to do when Mark goes off to New Zealand in the winter?

Go with him. I’m very lucky. My practice where I’m a GP has given me a six-month sabbatical and we’re going to rent the house out and go. To go and live there will be great.

Tell me a little bit more about your sailing. You sailed the 470 and then you sailed a Europe then the Laser 5000. Talk me through the various classes and where the strengths and weaknesses are. Why have you moved on?

I really enjoyed the 470 sailing. I was never big enough to crew the 470 and it took me quite a while to realise that. The 470s was good but it wasn’t that much fun. Socially it was pretty awful but the sailing was fantastic. The Europe was better that the 470s for me. I think I really enjoyed being my own boss and doing my own thing when I wanted to do it. At that time I used to sail every night after lectures. I was at medical school and at every weekend I just couldn’t get enough of it. I just loved it. The Europe is a lovely boat. It’s a fantastic boat to sail and its hard work physically. The hiking's hard work and I got a lot of satisfaction out of being really fit and being able to hike really hard. I had the time and the inclination, which I just haven’t got now.

It's a big step from the Europe to the Laser 5000, which is where you went next. What on earth made you do that?

Well I was dead keen. I’d done a bit of International 14 sailing and I was I really wanted to get into a mixed fast asymmetric class sailing with a boy. I’d sailed women’s classes for such a long time and I hadn’t really enjoyed it. I wanted a change so I crewed for Jerry Bernie for a year, which was great. He was secretary of the class and learned all about the boat.

I didn’t want to get a 14 because I didn’t have the money or the technical interest to be able to keep up with the rigs. Although it’s a fantastic boat and fantastic to sail it wasn’t for me. I just want to have the same kit as everyone else and go sailing, not spend hours messing around with hulls and deciding which rig to buy. I really enjoyed the 5000 sailing. I got my own boat sailed with Steve Mitchell. I sailed with Steve for about 5 years.

I changed into the RS800 is because we have such good club racing at Hayling Island and now I predominately want to club race. It's very competitive at the club. We get 20 boats out on a Sunday and they’re going to take us out in the bay from now on. Its just no hassle and I don’t want to go away every weekend now because Mark's home at the weekends. It’s a really good balance to have Saturday with him and Emily and then Sunday sailing. He has Emily on his own for the day so it's working out really well.

So in October you’re off to New Zealand for 6 months. Do you think you’re going to get any sailing in there?

Yes I’d like to try and get some sailing in. It will be difficult because Mark will be working 6 days a week. Obviously child care at the weekends going to be hard. I would like to look at the local dingy clubs and see which classes are getting good turn outs because I want to have good one design racing even if it's in a boat I wouldn’t really choose to sail. I wouldn’t like not to race for the winter.

Thanks.