By SUZANNE MCFADDEN
Olympians Barbara Kendall and Aaron McIntosh showed how to win without really trying at the European boardsailing championships in Spain yesterday.
Both New Zealand sailors went into the regatta with no intention of winning - and both stole the European crowns.
Kendall even went out of her way to try
to lose the last race - having already clinched the title - and yet still won comfortably.
"She deliberately went up the wrong side of the course on the first beat," coach Grant Beck said. "She was saying 'let's see how badly I can lose this for a bit of fun.' But she was still 100m ahead at the first mark.
"Barbara and Aaron wanted nothing more than to test techniques and equipment at this regatta. But they're both pleasantly surprised to be sailing so exceptionally fast."
Racing against all her Olympic foes, Kendall won more than half her races and finished a whopping 23 points clear of the next best sailor, Italian Alessandra Sensini.
Olympic champion Lai Shan Lee, of Hong Kong, was third. McIntosh won three of his last four races to beat France's Alex Guyader and Amit Inbar, of Israel.
Kendall and McIntosh were also trying out a new partnership, sailing together before a race to work out the vagaries of the course.
Two other Kiwi Olympians scored a healthy victory in Europe yesterday - Dan Slater and Nathan Handley winning the 49er skiffs at the Spa regatta in Holland.
Racing on the final day was abandoned when the marina was hit by 60-knot winds, but the Kiwis still picked up a $3000 winners' cheque.
It was their best result so far, with Spa one of the biggest events on the Olympic class calendar.
New Zealand's prowess stretched across the continent, as Dean Barker continued to lead the world matchracing championships for the fifth straight day off Split, in Croatia.
The new Team New Zealand skipper had 13 wins from 18 matches, one ahead of Australia's former world champion Peter Gilmour.
