Troubled waters for Olympic prospects as O’Leary quits

IRELAND may be without one of their strongest medal contenders for next year’s Olympic Games following a row which engulfs Irish sailing.

Anthony O’Leary, the head of the Sailing Olympic Committee, resigned yesterday after the Irish Sailing Association made changes to the selection procedure for the Olympics, despite Irish sailors been mid-way through the original qualification process.

The row concerns the “Star class”, a discipline in which Ireland have competitors ranked fourth and tenth in the world. The top ranked, Mark Mansfield, who is among Ireland’s best hope for a medal in Athens next year is angered by the process: “I am currently looking at all my options, but I am deeply upset about this. The ISA put a selection procedure in place in February, 2002, and we have been working all year with the target of getting to the Olympics in mind.”

The process allowed Mansfield to pre-qualify, if he was ranked in the top eight in the world on September 30, and his nearest competitor, Max Treacy, was outside the top 16. However, the ISA contended recently that, if Treacy finished in the first 16 at September’s World Championship, he could race Mansfield in trials next year, even if ranked outside the top 16. The ISA said the provisos were generating unhealthy competition between the two sailors and may have denied Ireland a place in the Olympics altogether. Having failed to finish in the first six at last year’s World Championship, Ireland need to finish among the first six countries not yet qualified at this year’s Worlds, to ensure Olympic participation.

“There is a wider issue at stake here,” Paddy Boyd of the Irish Sailing Association said. “We looked at the selection procedure and decided it would be more beneficial for Irish sailing if the competitors concentrated on qualifying Ireland for the Olympics, rather than competing against each other. We felt it could turn into a personal duel and then, Ireland mightn’t qualify for the Olympics. And if Ireland didn’t gain one of the six places in the World Championships in September, then we would be drinking from the last chance saloon come the World Championships next year.”

Ireland’s representative in the Star class will now be decided by the results of three international regattas between January and April next year.

This explanation hasn’t satisfied Mansfield or Anthony O’Leary, who announced his resignation in a strongly-worded letter to Boyd.

“It doesn’t matter if they believe this is better for Irish sailing,” O’Leary said. “We had agreed a procedure last year and we were half-way through that process. This is moving the goalposts at half-time in a match.”

O’Leary believes, if the ISA work towards healing the rift as quickly as possible, there should be no lingering creases by the time Athens arrives.