Olympic Diary 9/2

September 9, 2000

Today was a perfect practice/training day on Sydney Harbour. All eleven of our teams were on the water at some point.

The 470s participated in a small regatta organized by all the 470 coaches. US Sailing Team coach Skip Whyte was the PRO, while other coaches acted as mark boats, pin boats and mark set boats. There is excellent cooperation between all countries and their coaches. Next week will be another story though as the real reason we are all here begins.

Jonathan and Charlie McKee brought their 49er to the venue for the first time and spent the afternoon preparing for measurement at 10:00 a.m. tomorrow. The process will take at least one hour per boat and the McKees are number two in line. Carl Eiechenlaub has one half, and one kilogram pieces of lead cut and ready to go if any boats are below the weight standard. Carl also refinished the McKee’s centerboard and rudder blade. Courtenay Dey had two masts measured to see how the formal measurement will go later this week.

The Soling team trained with the AUS rep, but came in early as they have hull and spar measurement tomorrow. They then headed to the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia to celebrate Craig Healy's birthday.

Ed Adams has set up his weather surveys using my old laptop computer in our container so everyone can log on the internet and read the real-time weather and currents just prior to going racing.

The feel of an Olympic Regatta is becoming more apparent. Today numerous ISAF top brass arrived including President Paul Henderson, Vice President Goran Peterssen and Secretary General Arve Sundheim, along with members of the ISAF staff. I also spoke with two US members of the measurement team, Roland Smith of the Tornado class, and John Koopman of the Star class.

September 8, 2000 - Meetings

With high winds predicted for today most of our sailors decided to take the day off. It also turned out to be an excellent day for meetings.

Head coach Gary Bodie had a meeting with all coaches to discuss plans for the remaining training days as we need to spread around our coach boats so everyone has a chance to practice on the different course areas expected to be used during the Olympic Regatta. Measurement begins Monday and a coach has been assigned to accompany each team/boat through the process to ensure everything goes smoothly. We also need to be sure that Carl's workload is fairly free so he can make any adjustments arising from measurement.

Following that we had a full Team meeting as this was the first time the entire team had been together. We discussed a team dinner which we hope all the training partners would attend, especially as they are unable to get on the water training after the 15th; plans for sponsor fulfillment; race days plans including which teams would have spotters on shore to communicate with coaches; and Ed Adams gave an overall picture of our weather forecasting setup.

Hal attended a Team Leaders meeting at which only one representative from each team was allowed. The organizers outlined some proposed changes and asked for opinions. One proposal is to sail only one fleet on each course, for example the 470 M&W would not race together, nor would the Mistral M&W. Especially with those sailors having only one coach to cover both events it means one fleet would be left without a coach. We will take our athletes' opinions before responding.

The remainder of the day was spent reorganizing/cleaning our house. We have a section of the garage set aside to dry wet sailing clothes, and a place to keep extra sets of sails and we needed a small space for each athlete to store gear overnight. We also have organized space for our massage therapist. With a relatively older team there have been numerous requests for massage therapy, and we have signed on local therapist Mark Kenna to come to the house each race day following sailing.

John Myrdal attended the Laser drawing and now has his SOCOG-provided boat, which he will test out over the weekend.

Barby MacGowan of Media Pro, the USOC press officer for sailing, met with some of the team to outline the process for press interviews. Gary Bodie was first to be interviewed, coincidentally by a young lady from his hometown (Norfolk, VA) here doing freelance radio work.

After a week here everyone seems to be settled and comfortable. We hope this bodes well for the future as we seem organized and ready to go, whereas many other teams have not arrived, and some still do not have their boats to practice with.

September 7, 2000 - High Wind Warnings

The weather forecast for today was not good, with high wind warnings posted for late in the day. As a result some of our team went out early to attempt some brief training, while the rest stayed at the venue doing boat work. It was a good time for Hal and I to get some supplies that will make life easier.

First on the agenda was an air compressor for Carl Eichenlaub. Carl had to run his generator to produce the 110 volts necessary to operate our U.S.-made tools. As the venue is in a very upscale neighborhood, the local residents were not happy with the loud noise from the generator and complained to the yachting venue management. We purchased an air compressor that runs on 220 volts and it will remain in Carl's equipment container so we can use it for the Paralympics in October, as well as the 2004 Olympics in Athens.

The other major find was HARDWAREHOUSE, which is the Australian version of HOME DEPOT. We needed some supplies for the Team House in the village as well as some tie down stakes for the boats in the dinghy park. With the forecast of high winds today, and a forecast for tomorrow of wind ranges of 40/50 knots, we wanted to be sure all our boats and equipment are secure.

Our final team member arrived today. Bob Merrick, who had been on the road for almost three months, including a couple of weeks in Sydney in late August, had gone home for a few days after processing to rest/relax.

Hopefully tomorrow will not bring weather too severe . . . however, as the photo shows, it did not look good at 6:00 p.m. tonight.

September 6, 2000

The proverbial Jonathan flag shot! :)

Started the day with domestic chores at 48 New Beach Road. We have tried to keep the house presentable, which has turned out to be a challenge. It was fortunate the house had been cleaned as the USOC top brass showed up unannounced at 9:00 a.m. Sandy Baldwin the Chef de Mission of the entire U.S.A. Team arrived with Norm Blake, new USOC CEO. As I was the only member of the U.S. yachting delegation available, I gave them the grand tour. They were very impressed by our container area and the entire setup of the sailing venue. Norm grew up on Long Island Sound sailing Blue Jays and Lightnings and was impressed to meet former Lightning builder Carl Eichenlaub.

View of North Head from our vantage point on South Head

They only stayed for about 45 minutes as Sandy was conducting a tour of all venues in Sydney in one day. She was subbing for Greg Harney, Director of USOC Games Preparation, who had his appendix removed last week in San Diego during our processing visit. Greg had some complications and is still in hospital and not expected to be able to travel until September 20.

We set up a charge account for coach boat fuel by putting down a AUS $1000 deposit, but with 8 coaches and 6 boats I expect to be adding to the account about once a week.

Stars rounding the weather mark with Mark Reynolds shown leading (race leader Mark Mansfield, IRL) is out of the picture to the right.

Hal at South Head with our NIKON spotting telescope.

Following yesterday's huge breeze Hal and I decided to go out to South Head again and try to get a read on the wind for Star coach Ed Adams. Breeze was almost non-existent when we arrived, but we did manage to get a pretty good read on the wind and advise Ed prior to the start. Reynolds/Liljedahl were in the lead when we left and ended up fourth in that race, to win the very informal regatta overall.

Returning to the venue, JJ and Pease had just learned that some centerboards lost for a few days had showed up and needed to be picked up at the airport by 6:00 p.m. As athletes are not allowed to drive our USOC-supplied vehicle, I drove Pease and we made the round trip in just over an hour, enabling her to get the 6:15 Rivercat back to the athlete’s village.

September 5, 2000 - Spotting

With each passing day as more and more sailing athletes are showing up, training has intensified. One of Sydney's premier small boat clubs, the Woolahra Sailing Club, has run several small regattas that have been set up for the Europe, Finn, 49er and Lasers, and 470 and Stars on the outside course.

Forecast was for winds around 25 knots. I took a spotting telescope and went towards South Head (southern entrance to harbour) to see if I would be able to spot wind directional patterns. The panorama from the "Heads" provided excellent viewing. However, the 25 knot winds never leveled off, and there was a gust of 49 knots.

Mark Reynolds led the Stars and even tacked around for the finish line with his vang completely eased as he did not want to chance damaging his rig. He not only won the race, he was the only one to finish!! The 470s had one race and sailed in, and I could not see who won.

The SOCOG organizers held a quick meeting, and decided to assist the 49er and Tornado fleets with tie down lines. Our plan is to find devices to place in the ground, generally used to tether dogs to, and tie our boats down. There were no casualties, but some anxious moments.

While all this was going on our USOC vehicle acquired a local parking ticket, and in true Olympic inflated fashion it was for AUS$348.00. I think I managed to get it taken care of with some diplomatic mea culpas.

From 40 knot winds to fixing parking tickets it was quite a day.

September 4, 2000

Spent the day continuing to prepare container for the beginning of the week. Some athletes have been training elsewhere and it has not been too crowded at the venue. Hal and I installed an awning outside our container home and we are now the envy of the 2000 Olympic sailing venue. If there was a prize for best container we are gold medalists already. It gives the athletes a sense of pride and also a semblance of organization.

Carl continues to put in long hours and has been heard to say, "How come there is always so much work to do on Mistrals -- they're so small!" Whenever there is something broken, no matter what, Carl is there to fix it.

Skip and JJ/Pease going out to practice

I should also point out the unsung heroes present: the training partners. I hope that I do not miss anyone, and if so I apologize in advance. Helping the Tornado team are Richard Feeny and Jonathan Farrar. Steve Hunt and Michael Miller, and Mark Ivey and Ward Cromwell are working with the 470 men’s and women’s teams, respectively. Kimo Worthington arrives today to assist/coach Russ Silvestri. Kimo picked the busiest day to arrive as there are 128 U.S. athletes arriving from LAX and SFO between 7:30 and 8:00 a.m., including the entire USA Swimming Team.

Additional support is being supplied to Courtenay Dey by Norway’s Mats Wang-Hansen, the Europe Men's World Champion. Olympic medalist Mitch Booth (AUS) is assisting John Lovell and Charlie Ogletree. Our Soling Team is being assisted by America’s Cup skipper Russell Coutts (New Zealand). Others helping out include Danielle Brennan Myrdal for husband John.

And last to arrive, but possibly most important, is rules expert Brad Dellenbaugh. He has graciously been given time off from his duties at the US Naval Academy to assist our athletes with protests should the need arise. Here's hoping he has a wonderful trip to AUS with no work! :), but I know better and he will keep us all in line.

Lots of helping hands will make our team better prepared leading up to the first race day September 17 for the Mistral M&W, Tornado and Soling sailors.

September 3, 2000

Just finished dinner with the 49er training partners and coach Luther at Café Roma where we have eaten on previous trips. 49er Training partners Andy Mack, Adam Lowery and personal coach Kevin Hall arrived two days early to get everything set for the McKees so they could go right to work training.

The day was spent doing container work as our workshop container had been moved numerous times and it took Carl all day to organize the ‘workshop box’ to his satisfaction. Our last coach boat was launched and we seem ready to ‘pick up the pace’ for the next two weeks as the opening race approaches.

Hal and I drove to Bankstown (USOC headquarters) to pick up spectator boat tickets. We also picked up mobile phones for each athlete (the coaches were also provided mobile phones), as we all feel its imperative to be able to communicate. In Australia cars are righthand drive – i.e. the directional signals and windscreen wipers are opposite from what we are used to at home. After an hour drive today I have the cleanest windscreen in Sydney!

September 2, 2000 - Arrival

Arrived in Sydney at 7:45 a.m. (local time) on Saturday. All U.S. Teams were met by airport personnel, given a briefing and taken through a special immigration line. We were told to collect all luggage and gear prior to exiting the baggage hall -- it took us about 45 minutes to get everything assembled.

Outside the airport we were greeted by USOC personnel, and were they prepared for us! The sailing team was assigned security personnel, as are all U.S. teams (along with a few others such as Israel). All team gear was loaded and trucked to the venue courtesy of USOC.

Athletes and staff with credentials were bused to the Main Accreditation Center in Homebush Bay (Olympic Park) for a general briefing prior to checking into the athlete’s village. As one of the first U.S. teams to process not all of our paperwork was ready so USOC had a car for Carl Eichenlaub, Skip Whyte and I for the ride to get credentials. With credentials in hand (around our necks, actually) we returned to our house which is right across the street from the venue. Then work began! Carl opened his container and began getting organized. Skip launched three coach boats, and I took care of securing course flags for our five authorized coach boats, paying the deposit for the flags, registering coaches and presenting our "coach boat drivers licenses" courtesy of the US SAILING Training division (thanks Janine).

View from the US SAILING TEAM house at 48 New Beach Road. Sydney Harbor Bridge in center and white peaks in middle left are top of world famous Sydney Opera House

Ed Adams, Luther Carpenter and Pierre Jeangirard picked up our USOC car and drove to the venue, unloaded gear and then drove to Homebush to get their credentials.

The Team arrived at the venue about 3:30 and went to work. Madrigali, Healy and Jordan unloaded a coach boat and Soling, put mast up and are now ready to sail Sunday morning with coach Russell Coutts. Coach boat launched, flag secured and ready to go. Russ Silvestri's Finn was delivered to another yacht club, so he and Luther went by water to tow the boat to the venue. The Reynolds/Liljedahl Star was still in a container at a secure area and not scheduled for delivery until Sunday noon, so Hal, John Lovell, Mark and Magnus went to get it themselves.

Team house. Our house is behind the two cars in driveway. 5 floors. Street level garage, second level is storage room, third level is main area (kitchen, office, living room, etc.). Top two floors have five bedrooms.

Day ended at 7:00 PM with athletes catching a RIVERCAT (high-speed catamaran) back to the athlete’s village and some well-deserved sleep. The Rhode Island contingent (Ed, Skip and I), had dinner at the Elvis Cafe (he was not in attendance, but had been there the day before) and were off to bed.

September 2, 2000 - In-Flight

We arrived at the San Diego airport for the short flight to LAX to learn our flight was delayed 45 minutes. Finally underway to LAX we arrived with just enough time to walk to the International Departure gate for the flight to Sydney. The flight was extremely full, and I saw only 5/6 empty seats. Along with our sailors there were a few members of the U.S.A. Swimming Team (traveling in business class), Athletics Team (Track & Field), and some members of the U.S.A. Boxing Team (who received a huge sendoff at the gate from about 50 friends with signs, banners and even a Mariachi band). Also on our flight were teams from Trinidad & Tobago and Guatemala.

Flight time was announced to be 13 Hours and 39 minutes. We departed, an hour late, on Thursday, August 31, at 11:30 p.m., and are scheduled to arrive in Sydney at 8:00 a.m. Saturday, September 2.

Following dinner most of our Team slept, and when I awoke we were not even half way to Sydney. They display a graphic on the TV monitors depicting the air speed, time until arrival and outside temperature (-39 F). There is a simulated map of our flight plan that showed that we crossed the Equator just east of the International Date Line near the island of Apia.

Eight hours into the flight people are beginning to wake up and stretch and we just received a mid-flight snack. Water is passed out every hour to keep everyone hydrated.

Our plan for Saturday upon arrival will be that the sailors will go directly to the athlete’s village at Homebush Bay with Hal and Gary Bodie. The support staff will go to the venue at Rushcutters Bay, and our house which is across the street from the venue. (Mail for the team can be sent to the house: 48 New Beach Road, Darling Point, 2027 Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Mail from the States takes about one week to arrive.)

USOC has an individual who will meet every flight arriving at Kingsford-Smith Airport (Sydney) that has a U.S. athlete aboard. Al Baeta, a retired Athletics coach and Olympic Team Leader, has volunteered for this three-month duty and will personally greet the 650+ U.S. athletes arriving for the Olympics.

With all our excess baggage, USOC has arranged for a truck/van to meet our flight to transport all our gear to the venue. There are a number of training partners and personal coaches in Sydney, who will work with us and our Team hopes to be on the water Saturday afternoon, or Sunday morning at the latest.

The Olympic Odyssey Begins:

Arrived in San Diego Wednesday, August 30, around 1300 and went to meet with Greg Harney, USOC’s Director of International Games Preparation.

Following a brief meeting, Team Leader Hal Haenel and I went through processing. We were given a shopping cart and proceeded to fill it with 2000 USA Olympic Team gear – from blue blazers and neckties (designed by Bill Blass for opening ceremonies), button down shirts, t-shirts, formal shoes, athletic shoes, to socks and bathing suits. There were too many other items to count.

We were guests of the Navy for an excellent dinner that was followed by a general briefing conducted by three-time Olympian Ed Burke, an assistant Chef de Mission. The briefing included our sailors as well as athletes from weightlifting, triathlon and table tennis. Except for Magnus Liljedahl and John Myrdal, who were delayed by late flights, and Mike Gebhardt who was ill, all our sailors were in attendance. Courtenay Dey, Paul Foerster, John Lovell, Bob Merrick and Charlie Ogletree had arrived from Sydney for a 24-hour turnaround, just to complete processing.

Thursday, August 31, will be very hectic as everyone must check out of their room by 8:00 a.m. and be ready for processing. Between 8:00 a.m. and 10:00 a.m. the athletes will go through processing and pick up all their gear. By 10:00 a.m. all baggage for Sydney must be packed and checked in. It will be trucked to LAX for the Sydney flight, which doesn’t leave until 10:00 p.m. tonight. UPS, an Olympic sponsor, will provide each athlete with a 20x20x14 inch box to ship home with any gear they received in processing that they will not need in Australia. Anyone who wants to ship more home may do so at his/her own cost.

When checking baggage each athlete will be allowed their own two pieces and USOC will supply five additional excess baggage tags to each athlete. With 20 people traveling we will probably use all 100 coupons -- there are extra duffel bags, sails, equipment, office supplies, and gear from our three US Sailing Team suppliers: Douglas Gill, McLube and Yale Cordage.

After the bags are loaded, the athletes can sign up for the lottery for opening and closing ceremonies’ tickets. At the Bayside Convention Center, there will be a ‘corporate corridor’ where all the USOC sponsors will be on hand to offer their services and supplies to the athletes. Individual headshots, as well as the official USOC 2000 team photograph will be taken. Finally the athletes will be able to select their Olympic commemorative items such as rings and leather jackets. We will all then be driven to LAX for our 14-hour flight to Sydney.