Annalise Murphy interview at the McDougall + McConaghy Moth Worlds
by Jonny Fullerton 11 Jan 2015 08:46 GMT
9-16 January 2015
Annalise Murphy on day 2 of the 2015 McDougall McConaghy International Moth Worlds © Th. Martinez / Sea&Co / 2015 Moth Worlds
Jonny Fullerton talks to Irish Olympic Radial sailor Annalise Murphy, after day two of the 2015 McDougall + McConaghy Moth Worlds.
Jonny Fullerton: We're with Annalise Murphy after an absolutely superb day conditions wise. Annalise, sum up your day.
Annalise Murphy: I'm not really too sure exactly how my day went. The boat was going pretty slow, stalling upwind in the first two races, so I change a few things and it was a little bit better in the last two. It was stressful conditions, pretty wavy on the downwinds and I also learnt how to pitch-pole less; in the first race I pitch-poled five times, in the second race only twice, in the third race only once and in the last race I didn't pitch-pole at all, so I was getting better each race with not trying to kill myself on the downwind. Stressful but a lot of fun!
JF: On the provisional results you probably finished better than you thought but it just looked like you were having so much fun, you were screaming and grinning at us when you came through the line and said how much awesome fun you were having. How much fun are these boats to race compared to the Laser?
AM: It's just a completely different kind of feeling, you're going so fast and everything. It's a different kind of racing compared to Lasers and I don't think you can compare it, Laser sailing is much slower and you can tack 10 times in an upwind whereas in these boats you're going so fast that you're not, well maybe the good guys are able to, I'm trying to do as little tacks as possible! When you're able to go that fast you're going maybe 25, 26 knots downwind in semi-control it makes it so worthwhile. It's so much fun to be able to go and race against all the legends of the sailing world, especially with being a girl, being able to race against guys who are Olympic medallists and America's Cup guys, I might never get to do that again so it's like a once in a lifetime opportunity for me.
JF: By our counts you were actually keeping up and beating a lot of them, but is there anything you can do to depower the boat a little bit if you need to on these boats? Anything you can adjust to control that energy you get out of the things?
AM: I've seen that some of the girls have cut-down rigs for when it's windy which I think means that it's a lot more manageable but I'm using the same kind of rig as all the guys so I think sometimes I'm feeling pretty overpowered, but generally I guess, being a Laser sailor, I don't really understand how it works, in a Laser it all just comes in a pack and you put it together whereas in this it's so tweaky, you change a few small things and it's going so fast upwind in training but then today I just couldn't get the boat to go upwind at all in the first couple of races but then in the third and fourth I managed to get a little bit more speed, but hiking so hard and not going as fast as the guys who weren't hiking as hard as me I don't think.
JF: Well I guess you're used to hiking with the Laser, but is there anything you can take from Moth sailing the other way to Laser sailing? Is there anything you can adapt?
AM: It makes me love sailing so much. I can't help but want to talk about this the whole time, to my friends at home who don't have anything to do with or any idea about sailing. I don't tell them about Laser sailing at all anymore, I just tell them about Moth sailing. It's also really good for reaction speeds and things like that and pressure spotting is really important in the Moth, upwind and downwind you're always looking for pressure but in Laser sailing you sometimes get wrapped into the boat and looking at what other boats are doing and less-so about the big picture. In the Moth it's really important to look for pressure, especially on days like yesterday, but today maybe looking for less pressure was the goal!
JF: So are we going to continue to see you in the Moth for a good time yet hopefully?
AM: Yes definitely, I just love it. I've only been sailing it for just over a year now and I haven't had that much time to get to grips with it but I definitely want to try and get better and improve my boat handling a lot, I'm not very good at tacking at the moment and hopefully I'll be able to do the Europeans in the Summer after the Olympic Test Event.
JF: We'll look forward to it because it's been absolute entertainment today so good luck with the rest of the championship.
AM: Thanks very much.
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