Families celebrate city's new world champions

Peter Burling's mum Heather, and Molly Meech's parents, Simon and Deb, work at Dee Street Medical Centre. Photo / Andrew Warner

Tauranga sailors have played a role in an unprecedented day on the water for New Zealand yachties at the world championships in Marseille, France.

Peter Burling and Blair Tuke defended their overnight lead with ninth and second place finishes on the final day to claim their maiden 49er world title, while Molly Meech and Alex Maloney also defended their overnight lead to claim the inaugural 49erFX world championship.

That meant the Dee Street Medical Centre, which has parents of sailors from both boats on its books, was one of the merriest places in New Zealand yesterday.

Heather Burling, surrounded in her office by photos of her son sailing various boats, was in great spirits despite a broken night's sleep.

"Andy Tuke, who is Blair's dad in Kerikeri, and my husband watch it more than I do because I need my sleep for work, but I got up last night at about 2.30am and went back to bed on a bit of a high at about 4am," Heather said.

A nanna nap the day before had left her in good stead to see, via computer graphics, her son beat the last two Olympic champions home.

She praised the work the Tauranga Yacht and Power Boat Club had put in to develop its sailors.

"Peter has done all his sailing here and Molly has done most of hers ... Gary Smith will be rubbing his hands together there and rightly so - Tauranga yacht club is fantastic."

Burling has come a long way since he began sailing in Welcome Bay and has been mentioned as a possible skipper of future America's Cup campaigns.

"His aim would be the America's Cup, but who knows where and what it will be? That's one of the bad things about it - nobody knows anything until Oracle comes out and says what they are going to be sailing in - which probably won't be for a year."

Next door, Simon and Deb Meech related their picture postcard cliche of how to produce a world-champion sailor. They met sailing in the mid-1980s, before travelling, marrying and raising children Sam and Molly on a yacht for a decade.

Both children are now national representatives after sailing at the Tauranga club for about a decade since moving from Hamilton.

"Molly fell in love with a pink and purple P-class called Twisted Sister," Simon said.

The Meech and Maloney families find themselves in a strange situation. The families' respective daughters, Molly and Alex, sail together while sons Sam and Andy battle it out in the Laser Open division.

"It's quite a nepotistic family affair," Simon said, before Deb added the two families had prospered due to competition with the other.

"The boys have been doing it for a while now and they travel together. That's how the two families met and how the girls met."

It has been a fantastic year for Tauranga sailors. Olympic silver medallists Burling and Tuke won the world title after claiming the European crown and the Red Bull Youth America's Cup this year, while Meech and Maloney justified their ISAF world number one ranking by winning the 49erFX world title by a staggering 20 points.

The women's duo, who are targeting the class at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics, had earlier recorded top three finishes in all three major international regattas they had contested this year.