Yngling World Championship at Cascais, Portugal - Overall
by Team Shirley Robertson 12 Jul 2007 10:34 BST
Bronze at the World Championships
Team Shirley Robertson won bronze medals today at the ISAF World Sailing Championships in Cascais, Portugal. The team went into the final race, aptly named the medal race, in second place overall with only one point between them and their nearest rival Sarah Ayton and crew.
The double Olympic gold medallist and her crew Annie Lush and Lucy Macgregor needed to finish in front of her former teammates to give her a chance of taking the place at the Pre Olympics in China next month. A poor start and an incident with the German team in the first upwind leg enabled Ayton to take the initiative and finish ahead and take the World title.
“This was only the third medal race I have competed in since the new format was introduced two years ago. I felt we sailed a really good regatta this week, but our execution of the medal race wasn’t good enough,” explained Shirley.
Some had written the team off prior to this week’s ISAF World Championships, but the Team surprised many with their performance over the week. ”We’ve come such a long way in such a short space of time,” said Shirley. “Who would have thought we would be battling it out for the gold medal here against teams who have been together for the last three years?”
Team Shirley Robertson had just 10 months to prepare for the World Championships after the birth of Shirley Robertson’s twins Annabel and Killian a year ago. Obviously disappointed with the final result, the team are keen to continue if the selection process for Beijing is extended past the Pre Olympic regatta.
“I am committed to continuing our Olympic campaign for Beijing, if the RYA selectors think it’ll benefit Skandia Team GBR’s chances of winning another gold medal in the Yngling class, we want to continue . In some ways we really feel this should really be the beginning not the end! For now we will have to sit back and wait,” concluded Robertson.
Day 9 Video Highlights:
Day 9 highlights are available on our Sail.TV viewer. Live coverage is available all week for £3.00 on Sail.TV
Full results on the event website.