Waern takes Australia's fourth straight Olympic Sailing Men's Dinghy Gold for Australia - and his own second consecutive gold. And Bouwmeester gold finally confirmed. Andi Robertson reports from Marseille
Winning the Men’s Olympic Dinghy medal race in an assured fashion, Matt Wearn today not only continued his nation’s extraordinary run of gold medal titles to four but became the first Australian to win two Olympic Sailing gold medals in a row.
Wearn emerged victorious from what was an especially tough day for all top ten Men’s ILCA 7 medal contenders. A first Medal Race attempt was abandoned on the final run when the fickle breeze shifted in direction and died when the leaders were within sight of the finish line with Briton Micky Beckett in bronze medal position after profiting from Wearn’s need to sail Cyprus’ Pavlos Kontides back into the fleet.
The breeze hovered around six knots for the second attempt. Wearn worked his way to the front pursued by Kontides, the 2012 silver medallist, whilst ninth – ahead of Beckett – was enough to secure Peru’s Stefano Pescheira his nation’s first medal of Paris 2024, his bronze being only their fifth ever Olympic medal. Two penalties for kinetics – for rocking the boat – relegated Beckett to a disappointing tenth in the medal race, sixth overall.
While Wearn’s second successive gold extends the Australian powerhouse’s run started in 2012 with Tom Slingsby and followed by Tom Burton in 2016 the ILCA 7 has again proven its value as an accessible, true one design in which medal success is down to the athlete.
Photo: World Sailing / Sander van der Borch
Wearn said, “It was tougher this time. The expectation was higher here. There was pressure last time to make selection and this time once I was here it was just a matter of competing. This time being the reigning champion and winning the last two world championships that pressure this time was super high, I don’t think there were many people out there who did not want to beat me, I felt like I had that target on my back.”
He added, “Today I really had to dig deep and do all the stuff we had done in the lead up to this. It was super tough. I had had to be mentally tough and pull through and then just execute again on the third try.”
And of the combative duel with Kontides who he had to despatch and keep behind him, “It is part of the sport. We have seen it in the past and these things happen. I would be a silly guy to let Pavlos off the leash he is a fantastic competitor, give him an inch and he will take a mile. It was a matter of locking out that gold medal and he understands that too. He came away with a second silver.”
Photo: World Sailing / Sander van der Borch
“I doubt he is going to stop. He is looking younger all the time. Micky Beckett I rate so highly, he did not come away with a medal this time, but if he does not win world championships he will definitely win a medal next time. The fleet is so strong, this fleet the top ten were just going up and down all the time, anyone could have won a medal here.”
This is the second silver medal for the remarkable Kontides who also took home a silver in London 2012. It is incredible record for a small programme, which he shares with Croatia’s Tonci Stipanovic – who also won back to back silvers in 2016 and 2020. Third place here in Marseille also strengthens the global nature of the ILCA class as Pescheira came into the Olympic scene directly from World Sailing’s Emerging Nations programme.
Photo: World Sailing / Sander van der Borch
The only medal to be decided in the Women’s Dinghy was bronze. Gold and silver were locked up two days ago by Marit Bouwmeester – who today hobbled into the Press Conference after damaging her ankle during the in the water celebrations – and Denmark’s Anne Marie Rindom. After a spirited, full hiking scrap in 9-12kts, Norway’s Line Flem Hoest took second across the line to secure bronze.
Has this been an overly tough venue? The Netherlands G.O.A.T, Bouwmeester does not think so. “I felt people said Marseille was hard to read and unpredictable but I did not find it so bad. Through my pregnancy I did a lot of studies of meteorology and also knowing how the Mediterranean is different, I found that you could read the course and it just switches a lot. You just have to know when. I felt my coach and myself came up with some very good tactics while allowed me to produce my stable results.”
And the 2020 gold medallist Rindom, who today added silver but refused to be drawn on if she would pursue Bouwmeester’s record, also agreed, “I was here in August in 2022 and it was basically the same. I don’t think we had any days when we saw over nine or ten knots. And it was very hot then too.”
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