GOLD was the target for Charlotte Dobson at these Olympic Games and after a strong opening day the Helensburgh sailor is well on target to achieve that goal.
Competing in the 49er FX class with Saskia Tidey, the pair enjoyed a start to remember in the choppy waters in gusty, challenging conditions at Enoshima near Tokyo.
Victorious in their first two races and then sixth in the third outing of the day, they sit in first place with eight points after a productive opening day that saw a number of opponents suffer collisions or capsize.
Nine more fleet races remain before the all-important medal race but Dobson and her racing partner have made the ideal start.
“We kind of went out with the mantra of being just really boring biscuit,” said the 35 year-old who was born in Glasgow before moving west to the coast. “Just not doing anything stupid and no surprises, but then be really brave when opportunities are around when we can capitalise.
“We haven’t really raced as a fleet for a while and these conditions were different to what they have been in training here. I definitely got the feeling that the fleet was quite nervy, so there were a lot of people making mistakes at the start.
“If someone told us yesterday that we were going to finish day one like this, we would have snapped their hand off.
“We are absolutely delighted, but our mantra remains just to be really boring this week and do the basic stuff really well.”
Keen to get off to a good start, last year’s world championship runners-up went out strong and by the end of the first race had finished ahead of Spain and the USA in the 21-team field following a dominant performance.
Further success followed in the second race as they again topped the rankings, this time ahead of the Americans – who had led for most of the race until a late mistake allowed the Brits to take advantage - with Belgium in third place.
It wasn’t all plain sailing for Dodson and Tidey in the final race of the day, defending champions Brazil winning it ahead of the Netherlands and Denmark, with the British pairing down in sixth.
But overall it was a very good day indeed for the Team GB duo who will pick it up again on Wednesday and look to consolidate their lead.
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