Sailing: Soling team get breather ahead of medal shot

New Zealand's Soling crew will take Thursday off before resuming their on-water preparations for a tilt at a medal in the Sydney Olympic yachting regatta.

The crew of skipper Rod Davis, Don Cowie and Alan Smith finished the fleet racing stage on Wednesday in second place and do not need to race again until next Tuesday.

As one of the top three teams to go through to the 12-boat match racing phase, they now have a 50 percent chance of a medal.

The New Zealanders, top qualifiers Norway and the Netherlands gain automatic entry into the quarterfinal round-robin, which will feature six crews.

Cowie said the New Zealanders were ``ecstatic'' to have managed such a high seeding, especially as they failed to get through to the match racing in the pre-Olympic event at the same venue 12 months ago.

They were not too concerned that the teams who would fill the remaining quarterfinal slots would have had some hard racing behind them to get there.

``Last year in Melbourne, when we qualified New Zealand for the Olympics, we match raced from 12th up to fourth, so you can get hot,'' Cowie said.

``But we're going to make sure we spend as much time out there racing against other crews (in training) as we can. We won't be sitting around watching.''

Cowie, who with Davis won an Olympic silver medal in the two-man Star class in 1992, said the key to success this week had been ``sailing pretty smart and having good boat speed''.

Their boat was different from the one they had in the pre-Olympics and the crew felt it was better suited to the patchy conditions.

Davis, Cowie and Smith have all had experience of yachting's biggest match racing regatta, the America's Cup, but Cowie said that wasn't necessarily a big help in the Solings.

``You have to remember there are a lot of good match racers in this fleet, and Soling match racing quite different from America's Cup match racing,'' he said.

``The boats manoeuvre quite differently, because the Solings can spin around really quickly.''

Cowie said another factor to consider was the decision to move the Soling course from open water outside Sydney heads to deep inside the harbour.

``Racing in Farm Cove is going to be very tricky,'' he said.

``We're going to be right outside the Sydney Opera House, which is the worst part of the harbour, but it will be great for the spectators and for the sport.''

Eight of the 11 fleets will be back in action on Thursday, including two of New Zealand's other serious medal contenders, boardsailors Barbara Kendall and Aaron McIntosh.

Kendall is third in her event, while McIntosh made a significant move up his fleet yesterday to be fourth overall with five races to go.

Also back out on the water will be Europe dinghy sailor Sarah Macky, who marked her Olympic debut yesterday in impressive fashion by winning one of her two races.

- NZPA