Spain’s Diego Botin and Florian Trittel dominated the final medal race in the men’s skiff sailing regatta to take Olympic gold with 70 points.
New Zealand’s Isaac McHardie and William McKenzie won silver (82) with Team USA’s Ian Barrows and Hans Henken taking bronze (88).
Ireland, who had to restart after crossing the startline too early, finished outside the medal positions in fourth.
Low winds cause delay
There was frustration yesterday as the men’s skiff race failed to be completed due to inhospitable conditions, at least for Olympic sailing.
The sailors took off across the start line twice, but the race was abandoned on both occasions as the wind dissipated mid-race and conditions were deemed too light to continue.
Even after moving nearly two miles offshore, with hopes from the race committee that the wind would pick up enough for a fair race, many of the boats stopped nearly dead in their tracks while their sails began to waft.
It was a blessing in disguise for the Americans, who were off to a slow start in the first race attempt and had a lot of ground to make up to land themselves back in medal contention.
The Spanish held a consistently strong position through all three races, and so it continued in the delayed medal race on Friday (2 August).
Spain dominate the men’s skiff medal race to take Olympic gold
Botin and Trittel failed to win any of the 12 fleet races before the medal-race finale but claimed Olympic gold in style crossing the finish line first to secure Spain’s first medal in the men’s skiff event.
“It couldn’t go any better,” said Botin, who had come fourth in Tokyo. “We had a great plan, we stuck to it and it worked. It doesn’t always happen but it did this time. Amazing, amazing feeling.
“We had a very low moment the last time, finishing fourth. Experience is everything. Tokyo was a hard moment but it gave a lot of energy and drive to progress with this one, and it’s come out well. Don’t regret anything.”
New Zealand, so strong in this class, claimed another medal after standing on the podium every time the event has been on the Olympic program, with gold for the nation at Rio 2016 and two silvers since London 2012 in the men’s edition.
“It feels amazing,” said silver-medallist McKenzie. “It’s something we always knew we could achieve but there are so many good teams out there. To win a medal for New Zealand is a dream come true. We’re still trying to process it but we’re just so stoked.”
Conversely, Team USA won their first medal in men’s skiff sailing, taking advantage of a mistake by the Irish crew who were in a medal position after a strong performance before the medal race, but having jumped the start, they had to re-start and couldn’t quite catch up after that.
Barrows summed up the feeling for the US crew: “It went super well for us. A couple (of) things went our way, luckily, because this fleet’s so good. We need things to go our way, and we feel very honored and grateful to get a medal.”
Sailing: men’s skiff podium
Gold: Diego Botin and Florian Trittel (Spain)
Silver: Isaac McHardie and William McKenzie (New Zealand)
Bronze: Ian Barrows and Hans Henken (USA)