Sailing with the winds of change

"We are trying to make them like the guys who have 20 years' experience and have been sailing since they were six. In China you don't have anyone like that."

In recent years OC Sport has demonstrated how serious it is about showing novices across the globe the ropes of sailing by building national teams in what might be regarded as unexpected locations. It promotes the sport in places where sailing is not prominent such as Brazil, Oman, Russia and Turkey.

"When we started the project in Oman in 2007, there were no sailors or boats there," Turner says. "Now it's a great sailing nation. We had to learn how to communicate to an Arab audience, a different culture, and that's what we have to do now in China.

"Chinese people are very determined and focused, and I think if we can show how to develop sailing talent, it will become a very important sailing nation."

But for this to happen, Turner says, Chinese sailors need the financial underpinning of sponsorship, something that is an important component in events such as the Extreme Sailing Series. However, the Catch-22 of this is that to attract such sponsorship, the sailors need to have more to show for themselves, he says.

Extreme sailing presents not only an opportunity to expose new audiences to yachting, he says, but also to "make an event that is a sport and business, something that companies want to use for their business".

Most Western athletes and sports organizers use sponsorship to meet financial costs, but, by and large, Chinese companies remain blind to sponsorship's benefits, Turner says.

"Every boat has sponsors. We have the cities to invest, teams who invest. This is commercial, like most professional sports. Ultimately it's about making it work for businesses, and to make it work for businesses you need to make it work for the public and for the VIPs and the clients of the sponsors."

If the Dongfeng Race Team does well in the Volvo Ocean Race, it could open doors to a wide range of opportunities for both athletes and businesses in China, many of which are looking to expand their reach and boost their image, he says.

As for Qingdao, whose main claim to fame has been its beer industry and its German connections, it now basks in the nickname of the Sailing City, and Turner says that in yachting terms it is the place in China to be.

Someone who has a soft spot for the city is the British Olympian Sarah Ayton, who won a gold medal, her second, there in 2008. Big changes made to the marina facilities since then have been impressive, she says, as has been the number of young people who took up yachting as a result of the Games.

"From having no sailors in Qingdao to having a fleet of sailors out there was incredible, and that's what it's about. The Olympic Games have to make a difference, and to see the children out there sailing is a massive deal."

Xu Lijia, a Chinese gold medalist in sailing at the 2012 Olympics, is proof that the country has very talented sailors, Ayton says.

"Once you have champions in a country, it breeds success," she says, and such success is important in drawing sponsors.

Those positive signs aside, getting yachting to become a mainstream sport in China will be far from plain sailing, partly because it is hardly known to most people, and also because of people's attitude toward professional sports, Turner says.

"In the UK or France, it is a very credible, smart thing if you can become a professional sports person, and that's not there in China. Many of the parents of the guys on the Dongfeng Team don't agree with what they are doing. They think they should be working in an office."

Nevertheless, Turner is highly optimistic about sailing in China. In the early 15th century, China was the world's leading maritime power, when it began building huge ocean-bound sailboats, he says.

"China has sailing in its genes, and for 600 years it's been ignored, but I truly believe that in 20 years China can be the top sailing nation."

Carolynn Look contributed to this story.

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