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Nick and Joe teamed up together in 1997. Nick had already
been campaigning 470's for a year and had recently split from
his teammate. Joe, meanwhile, had just finished Youth sailing
gaining a silver medal at the ISAF Youth Worlds an event Nick
won two years previously. The pair met up at the Southampton
boat show and discussed the possibility of Sailing together
and decided to go for a sail the following week to see how
they gelled, after four days training the team entered their
first national ranking event which they won scoring straight
firsts on the second day.
The first problem was money, neither Nick or Joe owned a
boat or had the money to by one. On top of this fundamental
problem they felt they needed to sail full time in order to
improve quickly enough to qualify for the Sydney Olympics
but again at the time they had no funding to live off. The
team needed to gain a top 20 position at the 1998 ISAF World
championships to gain the lowest level of UK Sport Lottery
funding, but this was only six months away and a tall order.
A huge break through came a month after teaming up in October
1997 when Nick was contacted by accountant David Cole of Chappell
Cole & Co came forward offering his support and provided
the funds to buy their first boat and get their training underway.
David has since been a massive support to the 'RogersGlanfield'
campaign not only with financial support but with advice and
help with their accounts.
During the winter of 97/98 Nick and Joe spent long hours
on the water often in freezing conditions, they had one training
trip to Spain which was a bit of a disaster, there was hardly
any wind for the whole trip and they had the car broken into
and all their sailing clothing stolen. Nevertheless all their
hard work paid off when they attained a 12th place at the
World Championships (Joe's first senior championship) and
moved onto Lottery funding.
Qualifying for an Olympic games is never going to be easy,
in Sailing only one boat can qualify from a nation and there
are a limited number of nations so there is also an international
standard that must be met. For Sydney Nick and Joe lost the
initial trials in Weymouth to rivals Chris Draper and Dan
Newman by a single point. Due to the close nature of the event
and that Chris and Dan were significantly behind Nick and
Joe the selection committee decided to extend the trials to
the World Championships. At the world championships Nick and
Joe finished a personal best of 6th whilst Chris and Dan were
14th handing Nick and Joe the Olympic spot.
Going into Sydney at 23 and 21 Nick and Joe were one of the
most junior teams and despite making sharp improvements to
their results in the final 3 months were not a medal favourite.
They managed to raise their game at the Olympics finishing
an agonizing one point off a bronze medal, but in the process
proving to themselves they could produce their best when the
stakes were highest and that by Athens they would be a leading
contender.
Over the next four years Nick and Joe won 14 medals at international
events, and grew a reputation for having exceptional communication
and team work, a team that never gave up and often moved into
medal positions on the final day of racing.
In 2004 Nick and Joe won a medal at every international event
including a gold at the European championships, the year ended
with a silver medal at the Athens Olympic games.
Nick and Joe now move on in their 470 sailing with the goal
of World and Olympic gold. |