Hannah's gold medal hopes take a dent (From Gazette)

Hannah's gold medal hopes take a dent

10:10am Tuesday 9th September 2008 in Sailing By Simon Spurgeon

A disappointing second day left Mersea sailor Hannah Stodel’s gold medal hopes looking remote at the Paralympic Games.

Three finishes outside the top four positions in races three, four and five of the 11-race Sonar Class series, including a tenth place in their second outing of day two, saw Stodel, skipper John Robertson and Stephen Thomas drop a spot from their overnight sixth to seventh in the overall rankings.

It wasn’t the day that the British trio had wanted as they looked to make an assault on the medal berths and they will now have a rest day tomorrow to gather their thoughts and resume their bid on Thursday.

Overnight leaders Bruno Jourdren, Herve Larhant and Nicolas Vimont-Vicary of France maintained their gold-medal placing and are currently on eight points, four clear of the Australian boat in second, five of the Germans in bronze and 15 ahead of Stodel, Robertson and Thomas.

The British boat had headed into the Paralympics as one of the hot favourites for a gold medal after dominating warm-up regattas this year, however, the Games have frustratingly not followed that pattern.

They bounced back from a ninth place in the opening race with a third in the second yesterday and had been hoping to move up the leaderboard from their overnight sixth place.

Day two didn’t get off to an encouarging start, though, as the British trio rounded the first mark in race three way down in 11th place a full three minutes 34 seconds behind the leaders, however, they did fight their way through the field to finish sixth, 3m 42s behind the winners.

But things got worse in race two as Stodel, Robertson and Thomas were only able to manage a tenth-place finish, having been 13th at the third turn and almost four minutes off the leaders’ pace at the end.

It was a bitter blow as it meant this race became the one the trio would discard – teams are allowed to ignore the worst one of their opening ten races from their overall total – and they would now have to include the ninth place they picked up in race one.

Things got a little better in the day’s final outing, though, as they got tighter to the leading boat and finished in fifth, 57 seconds behind the winners.

With the discard now in place, the British trio were able to ignore their tenth position in race four, leaving them with a net total of 23 points, but still with a huge gap to make up to the leaders when racing resumes on Thursday.