Mucho wireless, satelites y teconología pero yo me sigo tumbando como siempre, me ca... en dieeeeeeéééé (la foto es de hoy mismo en Palma)
Fuente info Telegraph
London 2012 Olympics: Team GB making waves with new technology
The white van sits innocuously pointed towards the blue of the Bay of Palma, white satellite dish atop the roof.
London 2012 Olympics: Team GB making waves with new technology
The white van sits innocuously pointed towards the blue of the Bay of Palma, white satellite dish atop the roof.
By Jacquelin Magnay in Palma, Mallorca
Published: 6:42PM BST 29 Mar 2010
Along with the Skandia GB Sailing logos, the antennae give a clue that this is anything other than a backpacker home. This is the electronic heart of one of the most successful British sports programmes that, if all goes to plan, will bring five or more medals at the London 2012 Olympic Games.
In the nearby hotel El Cid, the expansive lobby bar area is dotted with Team GB jackets as staff and a portion of the 40 sailors here in Palma hunch focused, logging into the wireless internet the white van brings.
Being connected to home is one thing. Using the van's technology, masterminded by the Royal Yachting Association's technical projects manager Peter Bentley and meteorologist Libby Greenhalgh to interpret the weather, currents, tides, wind speed, wind direction, temperature, air pressure, and performance of their boats under all of those variables is another.
No other country appears to have a van set up so masterfully as the British. But that doesn't mean other countries don't have a similar set up, perhaps in a hotel room, says the Team GB Olympic manager, Steve "Sparky" Park.
While the British have been the pace setters in testing the limits technologically – the van has been travelling around Europe with the team for five years -and Park was secretly quizzed for several hours by Chinese authorities concerned about electronic monitoring in the sea off the 2008 Beijing Olympic venue at Qingdao – other teams, particularly key rivals, Australia, Brazil, the United States, French, Spanish and Dutch are seeking to get their own performance edge.
"All of the technology allows us to validate learnings and observations," Sparky said. "Having that data allows the coach and the athletes to build trust."
But a lot of those advances are top secret. Even the selection process for the British sailors to qualify for the Olympic Games is deemed "classified". There are no written copies at the moment in existence. Sparky does not suggest that the sailors have to eat the criteria once they are printed and mentally digested it, but one gets the impression that he would not mind if they did.
Sparky – a former Tornado and 470 sailor – who has been at the head of the elite programme since 2001 and has led the team to increasing success at each Games.
It is a team very much moulded in his own personality – friendly, but incredibly focused when required. In Beijing the team won four golds a silver and a bronze in the available 11 events. For London, which has 10 events, the goal is five, but Sparky is preparing the team to win 10 because "on any given day 50 per cent of athletes are not having a great day, but 50 per cent will deliver."
Before the Princess Sofia regatta in Palma – the beginning of the European leg of world cup events, Sparky scrutinises the training on a rubber ducky, equipped with a mast strapped with more technology that allows him to relay information to each of the coaches out with their sailors. He zips around to the Finn class, the windsurfers, the 49ers.
The women's match racing team Lucy Macgregor, Annie Lush and Ally Martin are at one end of the bay timing their starts – a critical component of the match racing format, which will make its Olympic debut in London.
In this class the boats are all identical and supplied by the organisers. It was training that paid off immediately, for on the first day of the Princess Sofia competition in light tricky breeze, the GB team won their first three match races against Denmark, Slovenia and Russia.
The results in the highly competitive 49er class have been also impressive.
Olympians Stevie Morrison and Ben Rhodes are currently in second place overall with two second placings after the first day but pushing them hard are Dylan Fletcher-Alain Sign and Chris Draper-Peter Greenhalgh in third and fourth positions.
Only one entrant is allowed in each class at the London Olympics. For Team GB that means the internal competition for places is tough. But on and off the water the GB athletes have everything at their disposal – there will be no excuses.
