Aug. 15, 2008
QINGDAO, CHINA -- All four Monarch alumni representing the United States in the Beijing Olympics on the sailing team competed on Friday, getting in one race before wind, for the second day in a row, stopped co-operating. Anna Tunnicliffe ('05-Plantation, Fla.) finished 5th to maintain her slot atop the Laser Radial leaderboard while Charlie Ogletree ('89-Kemah, Texas) opened the Tornado class with at 14th place effort. Sally Barkow ('02-Nashotah, Wisc.) and Debbie Capozzi ('03-Bayport, N.Y.) finished 10th in the only completed Yngling race of the day and slipped to fourth overall headed into tomorrow's Medal Race.
Leading the way for the former ODU students is Anna Tunnicliffe. Despite struggling on Friday for much of the race, the 2005 graduate finished strong and picked up nine slots down the home stretch to maintain a consistent fifth place finish. She is still followed closely by the Lithuanian and Croatian boats, who finished 1,4 respectively on Friday, but starting tomorrow, the Laser Radial class will begin eliminating their worst score from their total. Tunnicliffe has five more races before the medal race scheduled for Tuesday at 1:00 am (EST).
Barkow and Capozzi, with teammate Carrie Howe, will be the first of the ODU Olympians with a chance to medal as they hit the water tomorrow. The Yngling class medal race is scheduled for 2:00 am (EST) Saturday. The final race will include the top ten boats with the scores counting double. The team finished the 8th and final race (of an originally scheduled 10-race format) on Friday with a 10th place finish. They are currently in 4th place with 43 total points, just one point behind Greece. The Americans will have their sights set on Greece tomorrow as they make a push at the first sailing medal to be awarded in Beijing. At least five teams in the top ten will have a shot at the Bronze, though, making for an exciting finish.
Ogletree and teammate John Lovell were scheduled for two races, but only completed one on Friday before the weather halted all racing. The first race of the Tornado class saw the Americans struggle to a 14th place finish due to a shift in the wind. The start of the race saw winds at about 6 knots, but a shift to as high as 12 knots found Ogletree and Lovell ill-equipped to finish strong in the opening race of the event. The 2004 Silver Medalists will return to the water tomorrow with plenty of time to make a move up the leaderboard.
Top Ten Laser Radial Results After Four Races:
Name (Country) R1 R2 R3 R4 TOT1. Anna Tunnicliffe (USA) 4 5 6 5 202. Gintare Volungeviciute (Lithuania) 3 13 8 1 253. Mateja Petronijevic (Croatia) 8 9 5 4 264. Jo Aleh (New Zealand) 22 4 2 2 305. Sarah Steyaert (France) 11 1 21 3 366. Evi Van Acker (Belgium) 1 10 16 10 377. Lijia Xu (China) 24 3 10 6 438. Sarah Blanck (Australia) 6 11 7 19 439. Nathalie Brugger (Switzerland) 13 6 12 12 4310. Penny Clark (Great Britain) 2 22 1 22 47
Yngling Class Results After Eight Races:
Top Ten Qualify for Saturday's Medal Race
Team R1 R2 R3 R4 R5 R6 R7 R8 TOT NET1. Great Britain 2 3 4 (7) 4 2 2 5 29 222. Netherlands 9 1 2 (13) 1 5 4 1 36 233. Greece 10 12 9 3 2 (16) 3 3 58 424. United States (14) 2 8 5 6 11 1 10 57 435. France 4 (15) 1 14 5 10 10 2 61 466. Russian Feder. 3 8 12 10 (15) 1 6 6 61 467. China 7 5 (16) 4 13 6 8 4 63 478. Australia 1 11 6 (12) 7 7 9 8 61 499. Germany 8 7 7 11 11 3 5 (13) 65 5210. Norway 12 (13) 5 1 3 13 12 11 70 5711. Finland 6 6 3 8 10 (16) 15 12 76 6012. South Africa (13) 10 11 2 12 8 13 7 76 6313. Canada 5 4 10 (15) 9 12 11 15 81 6514. Spain 11 9 (14) 6 14 4 14 9 81 6715. Italy (15) 14 13 9 8 9 7 14 89 74
Tornado Class Results After One Race:
Team R1 TOT1. Spain 1 12. Greece 2 23. Netherlands 3 34. Ukraine 4 45. Australia 5 56. Great Britain 6 67. France 7 78. Canada 8 89. China 9 910. Germany 10 1011. Belgium 11 1112. Austria 12 1213. Argentina 13 1314. United States 14 1415. Italy 15 15
( ) - Excluded Score