ISAF Event Selection

British Laser Radial sailor Laura Baldwin attended the meeting representing the Athletes Commission but wasn’t allowed to stand up and speak on behalf of the competing athletes in the Council Meeting. “It was disappointing not being able to make the case for competeing athletes” said Baldwin. So why wasn’t she allowed to speak? “ISAF is very shaken by the level of personal attacks that individuals have come under over the past few months, and they didn’t want to put me in a similar situation.”

Personal attack or not, Baldwin still would have liked her chance to speak. “I spoke to many Committee Members and really felt I was getting the athletes’ point across. What I think is being missed here is how these decisions have such a massive impact on sailors’ lives. The problem with the multihull being thrown out of the Games is that the skills to multihull sailing are so unique, it’s not going to be that easy for people to step cross into other Events and continue their careers. My fear is we’re going to lose a lot of these sailors from Olympic sailing.”

At the moment the athletes are just pawns in the game. ISAF did the right thing by creating an Athletes’ Commission. However at the moment it is a toothless organisation. To have Baldwin there at the meeting, and not allow her to speak when clearly she wanted to (threats of personal abuse or no), is patronising in the extreme

cheers tornado alive that was the point i was trying to make. i think alot of mono sailers dont see a difference between a discipline and a class of boat, all along this hasnt been about the tornado its been about catamarans.

Therefore, whilst submissions were received proposing multihull equipment for the dinghy events and multihull equipment is included on the following list, Council added the proviso that 'the selection of equipment for dinghy events for the 2012 Olympic Sailing Competition will not be open to multihulls