Annie Haeger: Rebounding from Rio 2016

When the Canadian team lines up for SailGP’s first ever Canadian event on June 1-2, the home team’s strategist – Annie Haeger – will be best known for her achievements south of the border.

Back in 2015, Haeger was on top of the world. She and sailing partner Briana Provancha were considered one of the world’s top teams in the Women’s 470 division.

They won the year-out Olympic test event in Rio de Janiero, sealing their place at the 2016 Olympic Games. Then, to top it off, Haeger was named U.S. Sailing Rolex Yachtswoman of the Year.

She headed to Rio riding a wave of momentum and ambition, hunting for nothing short of Olympic gold. She and Provancha entered the medal race in first place, with fierce rival Hannah Mills (GBR) sitting close behind. Haeger had already beaten Mills in the test event. But when the starting gun sounded, she couldn’t do it again.

Haeger is blunt about what happened next. “I totally choked,” she says – it’s the honest admission of someone who’s come to terms with the bitter disappointment and frustration which followed.

Mills took gold – Haeger didn’t podium at all.

Many Olympic athletes – including medal winners – struggle to overcome the silence that follows an Olympic Games. But the abrupt ending to Haeger’s Olympic dream and the aftermath that followed was ‘brutal’. “I’m obviously very proud that I went, but my recollection of it isn’t positive,” she says, “It always brings tears to my eyes.”

The experience ‘completely crushed’ Haeger’s racing appetite, resulting in her immediate retirement from the sport.

Bruised, she started again from scratch, returning to ‘fun sailing’ on small, fast foiling boats like the WASZP and Moth. There was no competition, no pressure, no racing. “I needed to find my love for sailing again and I was just sailing for me for a long time.”

Alongside ripping around on the water, Haeger started a new career in sports marketing, married Canadian Olympic sailor Luke Ramsay and had two kids. At the beginning of SailGP’s third season, Haeger accompanied Ramsay to Bermuda, where he tried out for the Canadian team.

With her daughter in tow, Haeger got chatting to driver Phil Robertson. “He was asking what kind of sailing I did and I was telling him all about the fun stuff – the wing foiling and the WASZPs,” Haeger recalls.

With her experience on foiling boats, Haeger piqued Robertson’s interest. “He asked if I wanted to get back into competitive sailing,” Haeger says, “and mentally, I was just ready at that point to get back in.” While Ramsay missed out on a role onboard, Haeger was called up to join the team as strategist at Season 4’s event in Saint-Tropez.

Her first memories of the boat are visceral and sharp.

“I remember coming up to a mark and Phil [Robertson, Canada driver] turning back to me and pointing to a handle on the edge of the cockpit,” Haeger says. “I nodded, held onto it and that’s when he turned the boat – that was the first time of feeling the G-Forces on the F50.”

Haeger had gone fast on boats before, she says, but ‘there is no perception’ of the F50’s speed without experiencing it. “It’s just different,” she says.

That first event in Saint-Tropez was a baptism of fire. Canada and Spain dramatically collided in the first fleet race, earning Canada an 8-point penalty. “That was my first ever race day and my first ever race,” Haeger laughs.

Since then, Haeger has been ‘honing’ her strategist skills on the F50 and continues to juggle looking after her kids while racing around the world, as well as running her own sports marketing firm. At home in Vancouver, she and Ramsay spend their time introducing their kids to the pursuits of skiing and mountain biking in the local mountains.

And when it comes to sailing, the devastation of those dark Olympic days is firmly in the past. A new day dawned with SailGP.

“For me, I’m singularly focused on winning SailGP – it’s the pinnacle of the sport.”

For the Canada Sail Grand Prix crew list, click here.

SailGP information – Halifax details– YouTube – How to watch

Season 4 Standings (after 10 of 13 events; results and total points)
1. New Zealand (Peter Burling), 1-7-8-DNC/6-4-1-1-3-1-2; 77 points
2. Australia (Tom Slingsby), 2-3-2-2-3-2-7-1-10-3; 67
3. Spain (Diego Botin), 5-1-3-6-6-10-2-5-4-1; 65
4. Denmark (Nicolai Sehested), 4-2-4-7-2-6-9-2-9-5; 56
5. France (Quintin Delapierre), 6-8-6-4-7-4-4-4-2-9; 56
6. Canada (Phil Robertson), 3-4-10-5-5-3-6-10-3-4; 53
7. United States (Jimmy Spithill/Taylor Canfield), 9-5-5-3-1-8-3-9-8-10; 49
8. Great Britain (Ben Ainslie/Giles Scott), 7-6-1-1-8-5-8-7-7-8; 48
9. Germany (Erik Heil), 10-10-7-8-9-10-9-5-6-5-6; 32
10. Switzerland (Sebastien Schneiter/Nathan Outteridge), 8-9-9-9-7-10-8-6-7; 26

For scoring adjustments, click here.

Season 4 – 2023
June 16-17 – United States Sail Grand Prix | Chicago at Navy Pier
July 22-23 – United States Sail Grand Prix | Los Angeles
September 9-10 – France Sail Grand Prix | Saint-Tropez
September 23-24 – Italy Sail Grand Prix | Taranto
October 14-15 – Spain Sail Grand Prix | Andalucía- Cádiz
December 9-10 – Dubai Sail Grand Prix | Dubai*

Season 4 – 2024
January 13-14 – Abu Dhabi Sail Grand Prix | Abu Dhabi
February 24-25 – Australia Sail Grand Prix | Sydney
March 23-24 – New Zealand Sail Grand Prix | Auckland
March 23-24 – New Zealand Sail Grand Prix | Christchurch
May 4-5 – Bermuda Sail Grand Prix
June 1-2 – Canada Sail Grand Prix | Halifax
June 22-23 – United States Sail Grand Prix | New York
July 13-14 – SailGP Season 4 Grand Final | San Francisco
* Added October 3, 2023

Format for Season 4:
• Teams compete in identical F50 catamarans.
• Each event runs across two days.
• Up to seven qualifying fleet races of approximately 15 minutes may be scheduled for each regatta.
• The top three teams from qualifying advance to a final race to be crowned event champion and earn the largest share of the $300,000.00 USD event prize money purse (increases to $400k for Abu Dhabi with the winning team now earning $200k at each event).
• The season ends with the Grand Final, which includes the Championship Final Race for the top three teams in the season standing with the winner claiming the $2 million USD prize.
• The top team on points ahead of the three-boat Championship Final will be awarded $350,000.00.

For competition documents, click here.

Established in 2018, SailGP seeks to be an annual, global sports league featuring fan-centric inshore racing among national teams in some of the iconic harbors around the globe.

Source: SailGP