Nick Craig

Originally posted by GybeFunny I guess if you can race well there you can race well anywhere!

The tidal challenges are a little limited!

Originally posted by GybeFunny Originally posted by iGRF I wonder if Ben Ainslie or any other of those Olympians from Weymouth had taken the helm at that Endeavour with the crew of their choice wether the outcome would have been very different, personally I doubt it very much. I bet that race with the tide is tactical as hell and one thing they don't teach Olympians very well (at least not in the bit I know about)is tactical and tidal stuff. No need to wonder, Patience/Bithell who won the 470 Silver at Weymouth did the Endeavour last year (just a few months after the games), they didnt win! Didnt Nick learn to sail on Frensham Pond? I guess if you can race well there you can race well anywhere!

But Stuart Bithell won it the year before.

Nick raced a D1 at last years' Bloody Mary.

As others have said he's a really nice chap. When my boy robbed Roscoe's D1 for a race at Oxford early in the year while the other D1s were about, Nick just popped over to say hi to the boy and told him to shout if he needed any help/advice on the water. Cameron just stood there open mouthed in shock as this true legend grinned at him!

Hi, new to posting on this forum but thought I might offer some info on the Nick Craig vs Olympic sailor debate. Nick started sailing Finns in the winter of 2004 at a national ranking event in Warsash. I seem to remember he came 12th ish. He must have worked hard as he than promptly won the nationals the following year, (though the GB squad were not present). He than pretty much threw himself into Finn sailing for the next 3 years attending GB squad training sessions on a number of occasions. In 2006 he competed in the Holland Regatta coming a creditable 38th out of 72, in 2007 he sailed in the Semaine Olyimpique coming 49th out of 69. He finished off 2007 with an exceptional 20 th in the Europeans though the field was slightly weaker than normal due to the absence of some top sailors including the uk's big 3 (Ainslie, Scott and Wright).  He was a great amateur sailor in the class and a thoroughly nice bloke. I am pretty sure however that Nick would be the 1st to admit that the very top international Olympic class sailors are at a completely different level with regard boat speed, starting, wind knowledge and yes tactics. This is not to detract from him as a superb amateur sailor, his record in national and international non Olympic classes is in my view unsurpassed, I have only brought this up as I feel many sailors do not have a full appreciation of just how good the Ainslies, Scott's, Goodisons and other team GB sailors are!

Good post . I still wonder to what extent a very good "amateur" sailor could improve by being exposed to full time professional conditioning, training and coaching - and provided of course they had the single minded dedication to go with it. Matthew Syed has written a book ("Bounce") arguing that in top lever sport it is more about nurture than nature.