Help Nick Rogers and Chris Grube go for 470 gold
by Nick Rogers 11 Nov 2011 21:26 GMT
Nick Rogers and Chris Grube win at the New Zealand 470 nationals © Christine Hansen / NZL 470 Class Association
Our story so far
After 2008, 12 years of Olympic sailing and winning my second silver medal I was still in two minds as weather to continue. On one hand I’d achieved a lot and I was really looking forward to learning different aspects of sailing. On the other I still had a desperate drive to win gold and believed the ability. A part of it was to claim the gold I felt I should won in 2004. My crew for the last three Olympics, Joe Glanfield, had already decided to call it a day so if I was to continue it would have to be a new team.
In 2008 I got married to Fanny and in 2009 we had our first son “Dirk Danger Robert Rogers!” on May 22nd. I wanted more time with my family and in late 2009 Volvo dropped my sponsorship deal. This meant I had to go away even more to earn the money to keep Olympic sailing. I decided to move on to other things and started big boat sailing, I found a Melges 32 campaign and managed to win the Swan worlds, life was fun, new and easy going! A far cry from the Olympic 470 circuit!
In September 2010 over dinner with my cousin Simon, the conversation turned to why I had stopped and what it would take to give it another shot? He managed to organise a sponsor who promised us an amazing deal. It has still to materialize!
A month later Fan fell pregnant with our second. It was going to take a very strong case to start Olympic sailing again! After a week of training in December 2010 in the freezing snow I decided my Olympic dreams were alive again.
Why, having quit only months before? A lot of factors just seemed to fall into place. I had been watching as a coach and felt there was still an opportunity so why give up the dream, plus I had the promise of a sponsorship deal to fund it and most importantly managed to convince Nathan Wilmot the gold medallist from 2008 to coach us.
With this all in place I believed I had a realistic shot at a gold medal in 2012.
I would be starting a new team with Chris “Twiggy” Grube (6’4 and 72kg hence the nick-name!) and trying to get up to speed and ready to race in time for the selection would be our biggest challenge.
Being a late campaign we needed racing experience and the only racing going on at that time was in New Zealand, also where the boat was being built. This also meant we could train hard away from prying eyes!
The down side was the cost, having already sold my old boats when I stopped months earlier and needing to fly the New Zealand boat home plus living there for 2 months. The total bill would not have been a problem had the sponsor come through, but it hadn’t! £60,000 on mortgages, savings and a loan, I was already financially stretched to my limits and still 3 months of racing in Europe to fund.
In May we won the only British place for the Olympic Test Event and so the first part of our Olympic trials. Two days later my wife and I had our second son, Jonny! Despite all these pressures we had succeeded.
The Olympic test event proved that our Sail 4 Gold result was no flash in the pan result but again we just missed a medal. Still a great result and more experience.
The trials will continue to the Perth World Championships and if no-one can show true medal potential possibly further! The longer the trials continue the more time our team has to develop and improve.
Please help us go for gold
We are currently the leading British men’s 470 boat in the Olympic selection trials. We are in desperate financial trouble, having funded our campaign through work and borrowing, but we can no longer waste precious training time earning the money to sail and we can’t borrow any further money (they have already spent £90,000 to get this far).
Can you help?
Please go to our website www.GB470Gold.co.uk and donate whatever you can, however small. Your money will help with coaching costs, travel costs and also upkeep of boat, hull and sails. It’s a great cause and we need our British athletes to win on home waters in 2012!
Background on the team
Nick Rogers has won two consecutive silvers at the Athens 2004 and Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. This time it’s all about going for Gold. However the Olympic dream ends if they can’t afford to go to the next part of the Olympic selection trials in Perth, Australia in December.
Nick (34) and Chris (26) have just been funded via the lottery and Skandia Team GBR but unfortunately this is still not enough. They need new sails, new masts and coaching fees each month plus shipping and accommodation costs if they are to continue on their Olympic journey.