Australian sailors will compete in the 13th Paralympic Games with the sailing being be held in Qingdao City on the east coast approximately 690 km from Beijing. 

The 1996 Paralympic Games, Atlanta, USA, saw the introduction of sailing as a demonstration sport and led to its acceptance as a full medal sport at the 2000 Sydney Paralympic Games.

Paralympic sailing is a unique sport that manages to attract athletes with varying disabilities, by adhering to the IFDS Functional Classification System.

The three classes which are used in the Paralympic Games are the:

2.4mR, a single person keelboat.
SKUD18 a two person keelboat
Sonar, a three person keelboat.

Australia is sending 170 Paralympians to Beijing to compete in 13 sports – 95 are first-time Paralympians with the additional 75 returning athletes, who have an impressive total of 156 Games and 180 medals to their credit.

The Paralympic Opening Ceremony will be held on 6th September and the Closing Ceremony on the 17th September with the sailing competition between the 8th – 13th September.

The medals are gold inlaid with jade and opising the Olympic medals, the Paralympic medals have their jade parts showing on the front.

We wish all our Paralympic sailors the very best of luck as they compete for medals and enjoy their well earned success.

Message from WA’s Paralympian Sailor, Rachael Cox (Crew of SKUD 18 Convict Express)

Hi Everyone,

Well the time has come to say farewell, in just under a week the Australian SKUD team of Dan Fitzgibbon (skipper) and myself (crew) will fly out to the Paralympic games in Qingdao.  Our team is feeling physically and mentally well prepared for what comes ahead, and prepared to "sail to utmost" for Australia. We have spent countless hours preparing our boat and ourselves for this regatta over the last 2 years since we joined forces as a team, and look forward to the challenges ahead.

After our SKUD team qualified in September last year (at the IFDS event in Rochester) to represent Australia at the paralypmic games, we aimed to get as much time on the water and competition experience as possible.  At which point I decided to move to Brisbane to train with Dan in the lead up to now.  At the test event in Qingdao (May 2008) the hard work and time on the water became apparent as we placed 3rd overall, which puts us in a good position going into the games. For some pictures of us sailing at the test event and of information on the SKUD 18 follow this link http://www.skud.org/?Page=18384

Thanks to the support offered by my home Club, Royal Perth Yacht Club, Yachting Australia, the Australian Paralympic Committee, and Sailability WA of this campaign.  Also thanks to the support of my family and friends, and flexibility of the Cancer Council Queensland (my employer), and Brookleigh Estate in helping me to achieve my goal of sailing at the games.....I couldn't have done it without you.

To follow all the action from the games follow this link....
http://en.paralympic.beijing2008.cn/sports/sailing/index.shtml

We start our competition on the 6th of September and finish on the 13th of September, and in sailing to the best of our ability hope to bring home a medal for Australia :)

Herogrammes! can be sent to movinrmc@gmail.com during the event, and I will aim to keep you updated as the regatta progresses via email.  Until next time I will leave you with a piece of prose by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

One ship sails east and another sails west
With the self-same winds that blow.
Tis the set of the sail and not the gale
Which determines the way they go.
As the winds of the sea are the ways of fate
As we voyage along through life,
Tis the act of the soul that determines the goal,
And not the calm or the strife.

See Olimpic images:

Last Updated ( Wednesday, 03 September 2008 )