Annalise Murphy talks Olympics

She's just bagged two more race wins at Weymouth, proving herself a serious contender in the 2012 Olympics. Here's an interview with Annalise Murphy from back in January, as she excitedly looked forward to the Games...

Annalise Murphy is a real water baby. Brought up in a family obsessed with sailing, she booked her place in the Olympics, after only three years on the senior circuit, with some stunning displays at the World Championships in Perth in December. Ultimately she ended sixth, missing out on a medal, but her individual racing, particularly early on, was hugely impressive.
At 21 years of age, Murphy – who sails out of Dun Laoghaire – took on the best Laser Radial sailors in the world and, on a number of occasions, left them trailing in her wake. If she carries that form into the Olympics she will be in the final shake-up.
2011 was the year Annalise came of age. She finished third, taking the bronze medal, in the ISAF World Cup in June, held at the Olympic venue in Weymouth. But then she has the heritage – her mother Cathy MacAleavey sailed for Ireland at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea.
Our sole representative in the Women’s Laser Radial class, the word among the experts is that her consistency in Regattas still needs work. But if she has a strong wind behind her, she can beat anybody.
As it happens. qualification came quite early on in the World Championships when the fleet split and Annalise made the top half.
“Yeah, it was overwhelming,” she says. “And it’s still hard to believe that I actually managed to do it. If you’d asked me three years ago what my chances were, I would have laughed. I hoped maybe for 2016 – but I had such a good year last year and I’ve been getting progressively better. I was quite lucky. It was a six-day event and we couldn’t sail on the second due to thunderstorms, so they split the group 50/50. I counted up the nations and realised I was within the top 29, in the gold fleet, so I’d qualified for the Olympics. It was a huge relief!”
You’re still a long way off your peak years and yet you’re challenging seasoned sailors.
“For medalling potential it’s quite an old sport, yeah. Generally people with a lot of experience, who have been to one or two Olympics before, come through. The older athletes have been in every situation before and know things are going to happen that I would be completely oblivious to until it suddenly happens to me! At my first Europeans, there was this American girl, Paige Railey, in the senior fleet, who was unbeatable. I remember seeing her and thinking, ‘Wow, I would absolutely love to be her!’. I thought she was the most amazing person I’d ever seen, I was in awe of her. Now, she’s a person that I regularly beat! But coming eighth in the World Championships 2009 was just because I had had the event of my life. I wasn’t that standard at the time – but by doing that I got into the Sports Council funding system and they made it so that I could defer my degree in college and start sailing full-time.”
Choosing to defer must have been a huge decision.
“It was. I’d done my first year of Science in UCD and then I had a good summer sailing at the World Championships. I didn’t really know what to do, I was terrified that if I deferred I might just end up sailing for the next few years and not actually doing that well, having given up going to college with all my friends. It was a pretty scary prospect. I actually went back to UCD for two weeks and I was there going, ‘I shouldn’t be here, everyone else is training full-time’. My mum told me to go for it, that I’ve forever to finish college.”
Your mother has Olympic pedigree in sailing, and your father distinguished himself in the sport as well. It seems to be something you were born to do.
“My parents met sailing actually, we’re like a sailing-freak family! My sister and brother sail as well. I grew up knowing what Mum had achieved and was quite proud of that – so few people get to go to the Olympics. I started sailing with them when I was about five but I just enjoyed the swimming and splashing around in the water. Then when I was ten I went down and did a junior sailing course in Dún Laoghaire. That’s when I realised I liked it, so I started racing.”
How did your family react to news of your qualification?
“Both my mum and dad are really supportive but they never ask, ‘What were you doing in this race?’ We talk about other stuff, which is quite nice! I guess because my mum did it all herself, she knows the pressure that’s involved. They know when to back off or start talking about something completely different. They’ll ring me and say, ‘Yeah, so… the economy…’”
Given their romantic history, do they expect any boy you bring home to have his own boat?
“I don’t think they’d care (laughs)! Although my mum is always saying, ‘You’ll have to marry a sailor!’ – she thinks no-one else would understand
the obsession.”
Does the obsession have a downside?
“Well, having deferred college, I miss the whole social aspect of going out and seeing my friends. I do spend quite a lot of time by myself and it can be quite lonely. But luckily I’ve made great friends from all different countries on the sailing circuit and they’re friends that I’ll have for life. And at 21 I’ve managed to go to so many countries – Australia, Japan, New Zealand, America – all these really cool places. So there’s definite perks.”
So how do you assess your chances in London?
“On my good days, nobody can beat me. It’s a case of making all those good days fall together on that one week in August. I know I can win races in World Championships. I won six at Weymouth, the Olympic venue last year, which is a big boost. It’s
all going to depend on the weather as well, the kind of wind.”
What conditions suit you best?
“I really like it when it’s windy. That’s where I’m better than everyone else. I’ve been working a lot on my light and medium weather sailing to try and be as good in those conditions. Generally during a Regatta, you’ll have a mix. I feel I’ve really improved on dealing with that. When August comes around, whatever happens, I’ll sail my best and hope that’s good enough. Still, it’d be great if everyone could wish for it to rain and gale all summer!”
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