Sailing at the 1972 Summer Olympics

Sailing at the Games of the XX Olympiad
Special stamp Germany, Olympic sailing 1972
Venue	Kiel-Schilksee
Dates	29 August 1972 to 8 September 1972
Competitors	318 from 42 nations
Teams	152
«1968	1976»

Sailing/Yachting is a Olympic sport starting from the Games of the 1st Olympiad (1896 Olympics in Athens Greece). With the exception of 1904 and possible 1916 sailing was always a part of the Olympic program. The Sailing program of 1972 consisted of a total of six sailing classes (disciplines). For each class seven races were scheduled from 29 August 1972 to 8 September 1972 of the coast of Kiel-Schilksee in the Firth of Kiel. Kiel hosted the Olympic sailing competitions for the second time, having previously done so duyring the 1936 Summer Olympics. The sailing was done on the triangular type Olympic courses.

Venue

Kieler Yacht Club Kiel-Schiksee (Olympiazentrum)
Flag
Coordinates: 54°25′48″N 10°10′15″E

According to the IOC statutes the contests in all sport disciplines must be held either in, or as close as possible to the city which the IOC has chosen. Among others, an exception is made for the Olympic yachting events, which customarily must be staged on the open sea. On account of this principle, immediately after it became known that the city of Munich had the intention of hosting the Games of the XXth Olympiad, the cities of Kiel and Lübeck competed for the honor to carry out the Olympic yachting regattas. When Kiel (and the Kieler Yacht Club) won the competition the following was decided:

• a yachting center would be built in Kiel/Schilksee that, as was the case with the sport facilities in Munich, must be usable after the period of the Olympic Games as a future sports center;
• the city of Kiel will conduct a building competition for the Olympic Center in Kiel-Schilksee as soon as possible;
• the OC will form a committee for the Olympic yachting events to coordinate all contingencies arising in Kiel, and will in addition create a corresponding fulltime organization of the OC in Kiel in order to handle the necessary work and activities in Kiel on schedule.

During the Games the number of spectators and visitors at the Olympic events in Kiel and at the Olympic Center in Kiel-Schilksee exceeded the expectations by a large margin. Conservative estimates put the total number at about a million spectators and visitors in Kiel.

A total of three race areas were created in the Firth of Kiel of the coast of Kiel/Schilksee.

Competition

Overview

Continents	Countries	Classes	Boats	Male	Female
5	42	6	152	318	0

Continents

• Asia
• Australian continent
• Europe
• North America
• South America

Countries

Countries that participated in the Sailing event of the 1972 Olympic Games.
Blue: Water
Gray: Never participated in OG
Dark Gray: Participated in earier OG
Green: Country participated for the first time
Dark Blue: Country participated also on previous games
Red: Country boycotted the sailing event of the OG

Argentina (ARG)  Australia (AUS)  Austria (AUT)  Bahamas (BAH)  Belgium (BEL)  Bermuda (BER)  Brazil (BRA)  Canada (CAN)  Denmark (DEN)  Spain (ESP)  Finland (FIN)  France (FRA)  West Germany (FRG)  Great Britain (GBR)  East Germany (GDR)  Greece (GRE)  Hong Kong (HKG)  Hungary (HUN)  India (IND)  Ireland (IRL)  Israel (ISR)  Virgin Islands (ISV)  Italy (ITA)  Jamaica (JAM)  Japan (JPN)  Mexico (MEX)  Netherlands (NED)  Norway (NOR)  New Zealand (NZL)  Philippines (PHI)  Poland (POL)  Portugal (POR)  Puerto Rico (PUR)  Republic of China (ROC)  Switzerland (SUI)  Sweden (SWE)  Czechoslovakia (TCH)  Thailand (THA)  Trinidad and Tobago (TRI)  Soviet Union (URS)  United States (USA)  Yugoslavia (YUG)

Classes (equipment)

Class	Type	Event	Sailors	Trapeze	Mainsail	Jib/Genoa	Spinnaker	First OG	Olympics so far
Finn	Dinghy		1	0	+	–	–	1952	6
Flying Dutchman	Dinghy		2	1	+	+	+	1960	4
Tempest	Keelboat		2	1	+	+	+	1972	1
Star	Keelboat		2	0	+	+	–	1932	9
Soling	Keelboat		3	0	+	+	+	1972	1
Dragon	Keelboat		3	0	+	+	+	1948	7

1972 Olympic Classes designs

Medal summary

Event	Gold	Silver	Bronze
Finn:	Serge Maury (FRA)	Ilias Hatzipavlis (GRE)	Viktor Potapov (URS)
Flying Dutchman:	Great Britain (GBR) Rodney Pattisson Christopher Davies	France (FRA) Yves Pajot Marc Pajot	West Germany (FRG) Ullrich Libor Peter Naumann
Tempest:	Soviet Union (URS) Valentin Mankin Vitali Dyrdyra	Great Britain (GBR) Alan Warren David Hunt	United States (USA) Glen Foster Peter Dean
Star:	Australia (AUS) David Forbes John Anderson	Sweden (SWE) Pelle Petterson Stellan Westerdahl	West Germany (FRG) Wilhelm Kuhweide Karsten Meyer
Soling:	United States (USA) Harry Melges William Bentsen William Allen	Sweden (SWE) Stig Wennerström Bo Knape Stefan Krook	Canada (CAN) David Miller John Ekels Paul Côté
Dragon:	Australia (AUS) John Cuneo Thomas Anderson John Shaw	East Germany (GDR) Paul Borowski Konrad Weichert Karl-Heinz Thun	United States (USA) Donald Cohan Charles Horter John Marshall

Medal tables

Sailing 1972

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Australia (AUS)	2	0	0	2
2	France (FRA)	1	1	0	2
	Great Britain (GBR)	1	1	0	2
4	United States (USA)	1	0	2	3
5	Soviet Union (URS)	1	0	1	2
6	Sweden (SWE)	0	2	0	2
7	East Germany (GDR)	0	1	0	1
	Greece (GRE)	0	1	0	1
9	West Germany (FRG)	0	0	2	2
10	Canada (CAN)	0	0	1	1
Total		6	6	6	18

Sailing 1896–1972

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Norway	15	10	1	26
2	United Kingdom	13	7	6	26
3	USA	11	5	9	25
4	Sweden	8	10	8	26
5	France	6	8	7	21
6	Denmark	5	7	2	14
7	Netherlands	3	3	4	10
8	Australia	3	1	1	5
	Soviet Union	3	1	1	5
10	Belgium	2	3	2	7
11	Italy	2	1	3	6
12	New Zealand	2	0	0	2
13	Germany	1	2	2	5
14	Germany (EUA)	1	1	1	3
	Switzerland	1	1	1	3
16	Greece	1	1	0	2
17	Bahamas	1	0	1	2
18	Mixed team (ZZX)	1	0	0	1
19	Portugal	0	2	1	3
20	Argentina	0	2	0	2
21	Finland	0	1	5	6
22	Canada	0	1	2	3
	West Germany	0	1	2	3
24	East Germany	0	1	1	2
25	Austria	0	1	0	1
	Cuba	0	1	0	1
27	Brazil	0	0	1	1
	Spain	0	0	1	1
	Estonia	0	0	1	1
	Russia	0	0	1	1
Total	30	79	71	64	214

Remarks

Munich

Because of the distance to Munich and the fact that no sailing was scheduled for 6 and 7 September, the killings of 11 Israeli athletes had less impact on sailing than it had on the other events in Munich. Only a few of the sailing teams did not start at the last day of the races. Among them the Israelian Flying Dutchman team of: Yair Michaeli and Izchak Nir.

Sailing

• This Olympic sailing event was gender independent, but tuned out to be a Mens only event. This was one of the triggers to create gender specific events. This however had to wait until 1988.
• Some sources state the Finn event as a designated men only event. The Official report of the games does not mention this gender specific discriminator,
• It was the first Olympic sailing contest were only "One Design" classes were used. Also non of the classes was "owned by one builder". In general more than one builder was allowed. (The boats had to apply to what we now call open standards).
• Paul Elvstrøm was trying to win his fifth Gold medal. He left the games however premature. Assumed is that the media pressure became too high at that moment. Paul took revenge by sailing two times more at the Olympics (1984 and 1988) in the Tornado. One of Paul's crewmembers from the Soling took the gold later. Valdemar Bandolowski together with 1972 Dragon helmsman Poul Richard Høj Jensen won the Gold in the Soling class in 1976 and 1980.
• Although favourable wind conditions in September were predicted. Some of the races suffered from lack of wind. In the Soling and Dragon only 6 races could be completed and the 6th race in the Finn only three contenders were able to finish in time.

Sailors

During the Sailing regatta's at the 1972 Summer Olympics among others the following persons were competing in the various classes:

• Royalties
  •  Thailand (THA), Prince of Thailand, Prinz Bhanubanda Bira in the Tempest
  •  Norway (NOR), King of Norway, HrH Crownprince Harald in the Soling
  •  Spain (ESP), King of Spain, Sar Juan Carlos de Borbon in the Dragon
• Sportmanagers
  •  Belgium (BEL), President International Olympic Committee, Jacques Rogge in the Finn
  •  Finland (FIN), Past president International Sailing Federation, Peter Tallberg in the Soling
• First non American winner of the America's Cup
  •  Australia (AUS), John Bertrand in the Finn

Sailors at the 1972 Olympic Games

In Finn: Jacques Rogge   In Finn: John Bertrand   In Soling: Harald V of Norway   In Dragon: Juan Carlos I of Spain

References

• (ed.) Kunze, Herbert (1974) (PDF). The official report of the Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXth Olympiad Munich 1972, Volume 3 The competitions. Munich: proSport. p. 505. http://www.la84foundation.org/6oic/OfficialReports/1972/1972s3.pdf. Retrieved 25 May 2010. 
• Kubatko, Justin. "Sailing at the 1972 München Summer Games: Finn". Olympics at Sports-Reference.com. Sports Reference LLC. http://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/summer/1972/SAI/mixed-one-person-dinghy.html. Retrieved 25 May 2010. 
• "Munich 1972". Olympic.org. International Olympic Committee. http://www.olympic.org/en/content/Olympic-Games/All-Past-Olympic-Games/Summer/Munich-1972.