The wind was not on San Diego-native Graham Biehl’s side in the final rounds of the Olympic sailing tournament this week.
The 25-year-old member of the San Diego Yacht club teamed up with Boston-native Stu McNay for the 470 Olympic races.
Competitors race 10 rounds in 2-person boats and receive points depending on their ranking in each race. Tuesday was the tenth and final round before the medal race.
The top 10 competitors throughout the 10 rounds will go on to race for the gold on Thursday. McNay and Biehl ranked 14th overall – not enough to compete in the medal race. The same happened in Beijing. Team USA ranked 13th.
In their tenth and final round, the Americans placed fourth, after enduring much lower rankings in previous rounds.
“We had a good day,” said Biehl. “It was certainly the best racing of our Olympics.”
However, windier than usual conditions at Weymouth & Portland got the best of the two sailors, Biehl said.
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“By and large when it was windy we had a difficult time holding our lane,” Biehl said. “When we got to the harbor today, we knew the course. We are a strong team and we know we can pull it together when the conditions suit us. We struggled in the windier conditions.”
Competing in the Olympics was still a rewarding experience for the both of them, despite not proceeding to the medal race.
“It’s great to close on a good note,” McNay said. “The week didn’t go exactly as we wanted it to. There was a lot of disappointment in there, but I can feel really good about how Graham and I, our abilities as a team.”
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