Diego Botin and Florian Trittel won only one race throughout the entire Olympic Games, and it was the most significant one—the medal race. Despite not having the best start to the regatta, the Spanish crew reached the pinnacle of their abilities and clinched the Olympic gold medal.
“It’s a dream come true. After years of putting the work in with the best team, with our families here, it doesn’t get any better,” Diego Botin said in an interview with World Sailing. “Staying focused has been one of the key factors for these two days of trying to get the Medal Race in. We knew what we wanted, which was to do the best Medal Race we could, to win that gold medal. That made us stay very focused, we had a clear game plan and I think we managed to execute it almost perfectly,” added Florian Trittel.
Like in the 49erFX class, the male skiff sailors had to wait a bit for the medal race. On the final day, the race was interrupted twice, and in the end, the race committee decided to postpone the start to the next day. On Friday, August 2nd, the appropriate wind finally appeared on the course, and the Olympic medalists were determined.
Statistically, five teams had a chance at a medal. The Irish team, Robert Dickson and Sean Waddilove, started the race from second place, but due to a false start, they had to return to the line and restart the race. They ultimately finished in 9th place, which dropped them to 4th in the overall standings.
Another silver for New Zealand - Isaac McHardie and William McKenzie repeated the feat of their compatriots, Peter Burling and Blair Tuke, who also took second place in Tokyo.
“What a feeling. No words can describe this. This is something we’ve worked really hard for in the last seven years, so to come away with a silver medal for New Zealand is incredible. We’ve put a lot of time and effort into playbooks and routines in Marseille which has paid dividends. The first beat was perfect sailing. You couldn’t really ask for better conditions than that. It made for an awesome race,” said the Kiwis.
Ian Barrows and Hans Henken from the United States moved up to third place after finishing 4th in the medal race, overtaking the Irish team by three points.