Talk about going from Zero to Hero.
Four weeks ago, Bucky Smith didn’t even have a ride in the Etchells Worlds. Now he’s the World Champion, along with the rest of skipper Jason Muir’s crew. Not bad for a bunch of amateurs, albeit a very organised – dare I say it, professional – bunch of amateurs. They were up against some of the biggest hot shots in keelboat racing, as Bucky comments in this in-depth interview with Tracey Johnstone:
I had the utmost respect for competitors like John Bertrand (and his team of Ben Ainslie and Andrew Palfrey), Jud Smith, Chris Bush, Stuart Childerly, even the Barry boys, along with many others in the fleet. In fact, we went through the entry list after the Pre-Worlds and specifically identified who we thought were going to be the top ten. This was tough because so many were top crews. We memorised their bow numbers and sail numbers and the Barry boys were on the list right from the start. This made it much easier to know who was where on the race course and I think this is a testament to how much respect we had for the fleet basing some of our decision making on where our top competitors were positioning themselves on the race course.
Bucky reveals some of the tactical thinking that led to this extraordinary victory, which by the way was achieved in a 20-year-old boat.
The gap I had my eye on opened up and we had the opportunity to tack back into the front row again or cross and continue out into clear air on port tack. Luckily I glanced at the compass and commented to Paul we were actually on a good lift on port tack so I thought we should continue on. Also, Graeme Taylor, eventual Race 8 winner, was crossing the fleet just in front of us on port tack. Looking at the angles led me to believe he was probably the lead boat at the time. We continued on port, sailed into pressure and a good knock, tacked onto starboard and crossed 90 per cent of the fleet on good numbers and pressure. My main task then was to try and see where John was. I had been loosely watching his section of the line and his fleet positioning the whole time and when we tacked to starboard and crossed most the fleet I finally saw him a bit deep, but in clear air so he was still there.
For Tracey Johnstone’s full interview with Bucky Smith, head over to sister site SailJuice.com. The direct link is below:
http://www.sailjuice.com/articles/etchells-worlds-winning-tactics
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