de la Fuente & Calabrese Sail Their Way to Bronze at the London Games

London Olympics 2012

Juan de la Fuente and Lucas Calabrese are sailed their way to the medal podium at the 2012 Olympic Games

Following the postponement of competition on Thursday due to a lack of wind, the 35-year-old and 25-year-old Argentine sailors returned to the high seas on Friday for the medal (final) race in the men’s 470 class sailing competition at the London Games, finishing in third place and earning them 6 points.

Juan de la Fuente & Lucas Calabrese

That performance, combined with their results in the previous 10 races, earned de la Fuente and Calabrese the bronze with a grand total of 87 points, 11 points less than Italy’s Gabrio Zandona and Pietro Zucchetti.

Australia’s Matthew Belcher and Malcom Page claimed the gold, while Great Britain’s Luke Patience and Stuart Bithell came away with the silver.

Belcher and Page, three-time world champions, were the pre-event favorites.

The gold-medal race, which counted for double points, was held on the spectator-friendly, shore-based Nothe course.

Juan de la Fuente & Lucas Calabrese

It’s de la Fuentes second sailing bronze, after coming in third in the same event at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, alongside Javier Conte.

“I knew from the beginning that we would pull out a medal,” provlaimed de la Fuente about his second time earning bronze. “With Lucas’ talent and if we refined some things we needed to refine, we would take a medal. This is more expected than the other.”

It’s Calabrese first medal in his first Olympics. And de la Fuente believes he’ll claim more in the future.

“He’s the most talented helmsman we have and he has learned a lot in the last three years, as well as being a cool-headed guy mentally, very strong physically and a very serious worker,” said de la Fuente.

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