Winter Lecture Series - report

On Tuesday 22 November 2005 Iain Percy MBE and Steve Mitchell, gave an entertaining talk at the Club on 'Olympic Sailing' as part of the winter lecture series. The talk covered their experiences in the Olympics and in the European and World Star Championships.

The Star is a 6.9m long two-man keel boat. It is the oldest Olympic class, having first been used in competition in 1932, and still at the heart of that competition today. Many of the world's top sailors past and present have been involved in the Star Class. It is widely regarded as one of the toughest classes to win at any level of competition.

Iain and Steve are the reigning Star European Champions and the only British team to have won a Star European title. In addition to their European Championship win, they won a bronze medal at the Star World Championships in Buenos Aires in 2005 which was their fourth consecutive World Championship medal win.

Iain also won an Olympic gold medal in the Finn Class in Sydney in 2000 and Steve has been World, European and National Champion in the Etchells Class keelboat.

More recently Iain has been helming and skippering the Italian Americas Cup Team +39, and Steve has been taking part in the international match racing circuit with Ian Williams, an up and coming British match racing sailor.

Members found the talk inspiring and learned some key tips on how to prepare for top class events, as well as hearing about the duo's experience of world class sailing.

More information on the winter lecture series can be found in the full programme.

The next lecture is by Meteorologist Fiona Campbell who is a key member of RYA Team GBR's support team, and speaks at LCSC on 'Wind strategy" on the 19th January.

Julie Varcoe-Cocks

Copyright © London Corinthian Sailing Club, 2005