World Sailing must fix Olympic Windsurfing

Sailing has an image problem at the Olympic Games. Surrounded by other sports in which the winner of the Finals gets the gold medal, the idea of the lowest average score over a series of races is not the kind of crescendo that grips the television viewer.

The Medal Race was introduced in 2008, hoping that a final double-point no discard race could heighten interest. While it did focus our attention, when the lead a sailor achieves over the previous days is adversely impacted by the random winds of a course near shore for spectating, the integrity of sport gets questioned.

The Paris 2024 Olympics again had the Medal Race format, but for only six of the ten events. Of those six events, the leader entering the Medal Race won the Gold Medal afterwards in all but the Women’s Skiff in which the points were already quite close.

As for the other Kiteboard and Windsurf events, their final format became a Medal Series in which none of the cumulative points leaders ending up winning. Among these four events, the system used by the Men’s Windsurfing and Women’s Windsurfing was most criticized. Here’s the opinion of John Caig, 2-time Fireball World Champion and 1972 Olympic reserve:

Now that the Olympic sailing events have been concluded, it’s time to address why windsurfing introduced an unprecedented schedule. What was the reason behind having the gold medal determined by the winner of a single, very short race? And who made that decision?

In sailing, discards are traditionally used to account for the unpredictable nature of the elements, and other circumstances, which can lead to unfair results.

An Olympic Gold Medal, not only in sailing, is one of the most revered accomplishments in sport. On a number of occasions in the past, competitors have been robbed of a gold medal due things that we have no control over, like wind.

Therefore, considering how these potential uncertainties can affect any one race, why was it decided that this most prized gold medal, be determined by the outcome of just one short race?

Shouldn’t pressure be brought to prevent any such schedule ever being adopted again, otherwise an Olympic Gold in sailing will be further devalued?

Thoughts? Send them to editor@sailingscuttlebutt.com.

Paris 2024 Olympic Sailing Program:
Men’s One Person Dinghy – ILCA 7
Women’s One Person Dinghy – ILCA 6
Mixed Two Person Dinghy – 470
Men’s Skiff – 49er
Women’s Skiff – 49erFX
Men’s Kiteboard – Formula Kite Class
Women’s Kiteboard – Formula Kite Class
Men’s Windsurfing – iQFOiL
Women’s Windsurfing – iQFOiL
Mixed Multihull – Nacra 17

Venue: Marseille, France
Dates: July 28-August 9

Details: https://paris2024.sailing.org/