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Silver lining U.S. sailors tally two medals
SYDNEY, Australia (CNNSI.com) -- With a brisk nor'easter raking the harbor, J.J. Isler, along with crew Pease Glaser, made a dramatic comeback on the final leg to win the women's 470 silver medal Thursday The San Diego resident's medal hopes went from zero to silver in a few puffs of Sydney Harbor's fickle wind. A little more than an hour later on the same course, Paul Foerster of Rockwall, Texas, and his crew, Bob Merrick of Portsmouth, R.I., took the men's 470 silver by winning the final fleet race, leading at every mark. Australia won both 470 gold medals, its first in sailing since 1972. The Aussie crews were saluted with horn blasts from the huge spectator fleet and passing ferries, with the Sydney Opera House and the Harbor Bridge -- with its big Olympic rings -- in the distance. Isler made the move of the day in the women's race. In 10th place and out of the medals at the top mark, Isler sailed close to Bradley's Head and passed four boats on the spinnaker run to the finish. She finished sixth, enough to beat Ukraine by one point for the silver. Ukraine finished third in the race. Isler said she was passed by the Greek and Dutch boats as they took advantage of wind shifts close to Bradley's Head on the second downwind leg. So, with one shot left, she tried it sailing downwind the final time and began closing the gap. "Out of the corner of my eye I was counting boats between us and the Ukrainian boat and realizing, 'Ooh, this looks pretty good,' " Isler said.
"Nobody said anything in the boat for like 10 boat lengths," Glaser said. "And J.J. goes, 'We're passing the Israelis,' really calmly. And that was it. We got by them and that gave us enough points to beat the Ukraines." The women's 470 gold went to Jenny Armstrong and Belinda Stowell, who ran away with the final race and the regatta. The men's gold went to Tom King and Mark Turnbull, the reigning world champions. Isler and Foerster became repeat Olympic medalists, giving the United States three sailing medals in these games. Americans won just two bronze medals in an embarrassing performance in home waters in 1996. Brothers Jonathan and Charlie McKee of Seattle won the 49er bronze medal in Sydney. Isler, 36, took the 470 bronze in 1992. Glaser, 38, of Long Beach, Calif., was in her first Olympics and matched the silver medal won by her husband, Jay, in the Tornado class in 1984. Glaser had tried and failed to make the Olympic team three previous times. Isler and Glaser were unsure of their chances coming into the games because they lost training time after Isler became pregnant with her second daughter. But they also figured their experience would be a factor. "There were definitely teams out there that were faster than us, but we were really good at the racing thing," Glaser said. Foerster entered the race in second place and needed to win and have the Aussies finish sixth or worse in order to win the gold. Foerster did his part by pinching off the Aussies at the start and forcing them to tack off. The Australians were toward the back of the 29-boat fleet at the first mark, but made a stunning comeback sailing into the wind for the second time and were third rounding the mark, behind Foerster and the Ukraine crew. "It was pretty exciting when we were ahead, but we knew how fast they were downwind," Foerster said of the Australians. "We knew it would take a pretty amazing race to keep them from winning the gold." King and Turnbull finished second in the race, beating Foerster and Merrick by four points in the standings. Foerster, 36, of Rockwall, Texas, won the Flying Dutchman silver medal in 1992, then saw the class knocked out of the Olympic lineup. He sat out the 1996 Games, then switched to the 470. He trained intensely with Merrick, 29, and was the world's top-ranked 470 skipper coming in. "We were fortunate to sail a really good regatta, and even to have a chance to win the gold medal on the last day, you can't ask for anything more than that," Foerster said. The deciding races had been scheduled for Wednesday, but the wind died to practically nothing. Thursday was a more typical Sydney Harbor day, with the wind hitting 15-17 knots on the 470 course. Other courses had spotty wind and didn't get in as many races as hoped. Star skipper Mark Reynolds of San Diego improved to sixth after winning the seventh fleet race. Laser skipper John Myrdal of Kailua, Hawaii, had finishes of 1-2 and was eighth after nine races. Finn skipper Russ Silvesrtri of Tiburon, Calif., was 18th and fell to ninth after seven races, and Courtenay Becker Dey of The Dalles, Ore., is 16th in the Europe class after finishing 13th. Each class is scheduled to sail 11 races.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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