Well the worlds have finished up here in Zadar and it was a very tough event for us. We didn’t catch many breaks with the conditions here and were disappointed with our performance, but this is a world class event right before the Olympics and the best competition was here. We fought hard, learned a lot each day and have progressed greatly in our development. We knew 2 years ago when we started this campaign that we were going to be in tough to fight for a spot in London as there was a long way to go and a lot of top competition to fight through. We did fight through it though and have gotten where we have in our sailing on our own, with very little coaching. We can be proud of how we got here. Right now we don’t know where or what is next, but I can tell you being here and seeing the joy and excitement of one of our friends and follow Canadian teammates qualifying for the games has made us hungrier. We want what they have bad and who knows that may just led us down the path to the Rio 2016 Olympics!

Most importantly we want to thank everyone for helping us try to live our dream. Thank you to our parents, partners, siblings. Thank you to our number one fan cheering us back home, Sue and Rob Moffat, we wish you were here! Thank you to our sponsors focus metals and bytown brigantine. Most importantly our deepest thank you for being our biggest backers to Don MacLean and Cindy Wilson. You were always there in our times of greatest need, in more ways than one.

Tough day yesterday with more tricky conditions. The breeze was a lighter higher yesterday but still as fickle as the days before. It seemed like it really didn’t matter where you went as the leaders were coming off of both sides. We struggled at times, but again had some good moments. The fleet was very tight with only 10 boat lengths separating us from finishing ahead of 5 or 6 boats. If a couple tacks were better we hit one more puff could’ve been the difference between 20th and 15th, so we’ll just keep chipping away and hope for some better finishes.

Well it was a long first day of racing. The fleet was split into 3 for qualifying and we were the first fleet out and last one done for the day. We managed 3 races in light and shifty wind conditions, but managed with some good moments. We finished 22, 21 and 7 on the day. We were not pleased with the 20s, but in each of those races we were looking very good in the top third of the fleet, but got caught between the wind shifts and lost out. We learned some valuable lessons yesterday and thy were to stay out of the middle at all costs and keep chipping away grabbing every little shift to make bigger gains.

Today the wind is forecasted to be up, which will make things fun. Stay posted for more!

This is it, the moment we’ve be working so hard for, the world championships! Tomorrow morning we start off the biggest competition of our sailing career. This event is an Olympic qualifier and there are only 5 country spots left and 19 countries battling for those spots. Over the past we have shown we have the potential to have some big success at these events, but we are not underestimating the competition. It is going to be very difficult for Canada to get into one of those 5 open spots, but if we sail the competition of our lives we can do it.

With that said we need to thank our sponsors, friends and especially family for being behind us the entire way. Without our family we could not be here competing now and we are forever thankful. We’re going to go out guns blazing to make everyone proud! So wish us luck, the battle starts tomorrow!!!

We had another solid day on the water yesterday in lighter winds 6-8 knots and some of the leftover waves from the day before. We did a nice long upwind by ourselves followed by a downwind to warm up and get up to speed. Then we tuned up wind with our newfie friends and had really great speed and height. After the tuning we jumped into a couple practice races with 15 international teams. On the first race we had a great start and were battling for the lead. We rounded the windward in 3rd and held on to that to the finish. The next two races we missed the starts and jumped into the middle of the race and had some good moments and got some more information on the breeze and waves here. Overall we were really happy with the day and proved to ourselves that with a good start we can compete with the best.

After getting off the water we had a little down time with another Canadian team and went out to the supernova which is a big mall here.

Today there isn’t much breeze and we’re in a holding pattern hoping for some more breeze.

Today we experienced the ocean breeze that I never got to see during the 10 days I was here in Zadar coaching last year. The waves were some of the biggest swell that we’ve ever sailed and it was crazy fun! It was only blowing 12 knots and topping out at about 14knots, but again these waves were like nothing we’ve sailed in before. They were big enough that we were surfing upwind on the big ones! We took the opportunity to really focus in on how to deal with the waves and did a couple really big up and downs to figure them out. One thing we learned very quickly is that your maneuvers need to be really coordinated with the waves. Heading downwind if you didn’t nail the first turn down on the gybe while at full speed, surfing the front of the wave, the boat would lose all it’s speed and the gybe would not be the prettiest. We figured it out quickly though and had some very nice tacks and gybes.

Tomorrow we’re getting into more of a race mode and we’ll be sailing during the scheduled racing time at 12 to start getting a better feel for what we’ll be facing.

Below is bonzo the guard dog at our apartment. He greets us every morning when we leave and every night when we return home. It’s nice to come home to him so happy to see us. For that reason we let the barking late at night slide!

Today we had our first sail in Croatia. The sea breeze came in a little bit with winds in the 6 to 8 knots range. We had just over 2 hours on the water to ease ourselves back into things. We did a long upwind and downwind to get the feel back and then jumped in for a couple of practice races. The races were more about getting the feel back for sailing with higher competition than the end result. We felt good at times and it’s only a matter of time before the boat speed is back up to where it needs to be. We learned a couple lessons on the wind and it’s tendencies and in the last races made a couple good calls. This coming week we really want to focus on keeping things simple and making good decisions on the course. In the past we’ve been guilty of making rash decisions and it hasn’t gotten us anywhere good!

Well we made it in safe and sound to Zadar. The trip here was actually fairly easy. We were lucky enough to get a direct flight to Frankfurt from Ottawa, which was nice so the trip didnt start by going backwards to toronto. We did however have to do some running through the Frankfurt terminal to our gate as our first flight was late, but we just made it in time. From Frankfurt it was just two quick flights, both under an hour and we were in.

In Zadar our friend and fellow canadian teammate Gordo, picked us up and drove us down to the boat to drop our gear off and then dropped us off at our apartment.

Our apartment is good, and we each have our own bed (Tom has to singles pushed together!). We are a bit of a hike away from the boat (25 mins walking), but it’s manageable.

Today we spent the day setting up our boat that we chartered from Gordo and it’s a well set up boat. We added most of our own parts and lines to make it more like our own boat from home. It is all set up now and we are looking forward to hitting the water tomorrow!

Just getting ready to board our flight to worlds in Croatia! We are really excited to get there and hit the water to prepare for the event that starts on the 5th. This is the last opportunity to qualify for the Olympics and if we sail our bet event we have a chance. Stay tuned for more updates!

In just over a month we’ll be in Croatia racing at the 2012 World Championships with a shot at qualifying for the London Olympics. It has been a long road here and we can see the big hill we’ve been climbing for the past two years starting to level out. Croatia will be the last shot for teams trying to make the games and we want to make sure we are there. Since we’ve been home we’ve been working hard at the gym to stay fit and working even harder at finishing off the last fundraising we need to get to the Worlds. Right now we are still a little behind and need your support to make sure we get to this final stage. If you are interested in making a donation or sponsoring us please let us know at info@teamfrostarbuckle.com.