Jessica left Sydney on Tuesday for the final build up to the Olympics games in Weymouth.

She has managed to recently pack on 2 kilos of lean muscle. Not bad considering she has been eating such things like broccoli for breakfast!
She is truly giving it everything she has got to be in contention for the medals.

Jessica is Australia's most successful sailor, she has won two PWA overall titles and this is her 4 Olympic games. Or 5th if you count the demonstration event at the LA games in 1984! Yes 1984, 28 years ago!

You can send her a message here
http://www.australiansailingteam.com.au/default.asp?ID=4226

What a career she had.
Remember seeing her do her wares at Balmoral, like early 80s ?
Incredible longevity, at the top level too...

Good luck Jessica - I'll be rooting for you.

SeanAUS120 said...

Have got tickets to see the sailing in Weymouth! Should be awesome. Go Jess!!!

That's about the only way you'll get to see it as well - sadly olympic windsurfing coverage is nil to non-existent.

They'll have to find a way to make it entertaining.
A bunch of sails all going same tacks for half-hour is not very exciting on TV, even in fair winds.

Perhaps the jousting at the starting line, that's always good fun to watch (and partake in).

redsurfbus said...

They will be sailing less than 2 miles from where I am typing this......
The Olympic organising commitee (locog) have taken over our public land, are putting up fences, not letting us locals see anything. Where we usually launch from at Portland Harbour has now been fenced around in the last couple of days so we cannot launch from there......the event is still a couple of months away as well! The olympics so far have pretty much destroyed the local town, all money has gone on roads and roadworks leaving the town centre like a ghost town with many boarded up shops as no-one was willing to wait for hours in traffic over the last year while they put in traffic lights that will change for the VIPs as they go through.

Obviously we will be supporting Nick Dempsey and Bryony Shaw here but if my gf could get the time off work we would be heading as far from here as possible while the olympics are on.

Hope you have a nice time here in Weymouth Sean, maybe they will get round to cleaning it
up a bit in the next few months, at the moment I almost feel embarrassed that I live here it is
that bad now.....It is still a great place dont get me wrong, it is just that the rich and those i

control have made sure that all the visitors will line their pockets and leave the locals without
a penny.

That's sad to hear, the true face of the Olympics eh.

I have so meany great memory's of sailing Weymouth with my dad when I was younger.
i used to drive down from Bristol on a friday night after the pub shut (2 beers max)and sleep in my car on the top of Portland bill so I could get 8 hrs sailing in the next day.
I learnt to water start and gybe there.

Does the guy still build the statues out of sand on the beach? Bloody amazing

gazza said...

That's sad to hear, the true face of the Olympics eh.

I have so meany great memory's of sailing Weymouth with my dad when I was younger.
i used to drive down from Bristol on a friday night after the pub shut (2 beers max)and sleep in my car on the top of Portland bill so I could get 8 hrs sailing in the next day.
I learnt to water start and gybe there.

Does the guy still build the statues out of sand on the beach? Bloody amazing

It is sad, so many resources that were for youngsters have been diverted to the yachtie community here, local playing fields have been built on (the school I work at is on Portland, a lot of the kids used to use the playing fields near the sailing academy in the evenings for football etc, now they are an olympic village with houses made from cardboard, Portland is a poor community and these houses are up for sale at over double the national average house price!).

As you may know there are 3 roads in/out of Weymouth, one from the north and the coast roads, I am planning to get used to getting up at 4am to vacate the area when there is a wind forecast somewhere close by as it will be gridlock all day everyday for the summer.

As for parking on Portland Bill......thats some trick, the Bill is the lighthouse ;-)

The guy still builds on the beach, but think his priorities are elsewhere now, for the past 2 years it has been the Jonny Depp Alice in Wonderland scene with them all at the table, they now do a show that charges a fortune for entrance with lots of statues in at the other end of the beach.

Hopefully this year will have some wind, the past 3 summers have been windy but the latter half of August after a few weeks of nothing late July to early August. It can be a lovely windy place, I secretly hope we get gale force winds that will let the windsurfers show the sport off for the last time at the olympics.

Good luck to everyone competing