Day 8

Short day at work for us. We got 5th in the first race of the day and wrapped up the victory. Step one accomplished.

The rest of the fleet stayed out there and completed the last two races. Our training partners Andy Lovell/Magnus Liljedahl finished second. This is a fantastic result in light of the fact that they broke their mast in race one and could not sail race two. George Szabo/Mark Strube were third. You can find the full results at: www.ussailing.org/olympics/Olympic Trials/2004/Star/Results.asp

I want to thank a few people: first my wife and best friend Icka. Without her support and love none of this would be possible for me. Secondly, Phil did an awesome job. Really he saved the regatta for us on day one when we laid the boat down in a huge gust and he got the pole off the mast so it did not break. We sailed a very consistent regatta and this is definitely a two man boat. Next, my physical trainer Sam Brovender. When I decided to get serious about this Olympic campaign, one year ago, I hired Sam He has gotten me into better shape than when I won the World Championship in 1988! Next, John Craig. JC has been our general operational coordinator, coach, weather man, tender drive and friend this spring. He was a key ingredient in us winning these trials and we will miss him as he goes back to his real job at St. Francis Yacht Club. I want to thank St. Francis Yacht Club for their support in my campaign and all the others through the years! Next, I need to thank the Diaz family; Gonzo and Maricel. Phil and I basically lived at their home for 5 months this winter. They were great hosts and helped us out tremendously. Thanks to Brad Dallenbaugh who helped me prepare from a rules standpoint and was on call for any protest situations this week. Fortunately none arose. Also, Bret Davis, our windward mark weatherman did a fantastic job for us this week. A big THANK YOU to all these people. This was a big challenge and required a big team and lot of organization and coordination to get it done right.

Winning this regatta means we earned the right to work extremely hard for the next five months. Now we have the honor and responsibility of representing the USA at the Olympics in the Star Class and living up to the results that have been achieved by those preceding us. That is no small task.

I am going on a business trip to Europe tomorrow so a forced respite from the gym for a week or so but I will be back at it on April 8th for even harder workouts than what I have been doing the past 12 months.

Our immediate sailing schedule is that the boat is being shipped to Italy tomorrow for the World Championship which starts April 23. It will stay over there until August and we will fly back and forth doing various regattas and training sessions in Europe and Athens.

I am off to dinner now. Maybe more latter in the week after I digest this a bit more. Thank you for all your nice emails and good thoughts. It helps us to know we have some many friends out there.