Muscat: Musab al Hadi, the skipper of the Oman 49er Olympic class boats that have been part of the Olympics since 2000, has been through a tough season and decided to share some of the grueling experiences that he’s had at sea this season.
“The season was a difficult season for us as we have faced many troubles and issues. This is why this sport is so hard, it is hard to be consistent,’’ he had.
“We faced many troubles, one of the issues we faced was with regard to our crew. My crew named Hashim suffered an injury, sailing in France. One day while sailing we had a very strong breeze. It was time to go back to the shore, blowing more than 25 knots. Hashim was stuck in the footstrap at the back of the boat.
“Finally, Hashim was retrieved but he was screaming because of the excruciating pain and the doctors said it would take three to four months to recover.’’
They had to find another person to fill in for Hashim.
“And because of this we needed to find another person. I decided to go and sail with an experienced person and his name is Yan. We will compete in Kiel in Germany. We had another championship coming up in Porto. This guy was not available and I had to find another person to compete in the Olympic class and I finally found another Frenchman named Clemont.”
“In the last minute, we made it to Porto. And we competed in Porto and we had a good time, competing and learning.”
“Olympics is still three years away, so we still have time to learn and grow before that.
The last regatta I did was in Abu Dhabi. I competed in the laser class there, not the Olympic, it is a smaller boat. Got second place was happy to come back from Abu Dhabi with a medal and cup. I was happy and it was good to finish the season this way.”
Haridev Pushparaj
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