If you are the top prospect to represent the United States in women's sailing at the 2000 Olympics, how do you spend your free time?
Being showered with gifts from hordes of adoring fans? Sipping tea at prestigious yacht clubs nationwide?
Buffing your dock-siders?
Try waiting around at an international shipping port in Boston for mobile-home-sized industrial containers.
"I'm waiting to pick up the van we had in Europe. We usually send back a boat, too. But today it's just the van," Whitney Connor '95 said.
Connor, along with her partner Elizabeth Kratzig, just finished up a two-month tour of Europe, where they visited France, the Netherlands, Denmark and Germany and sailed in four international regattas.
Connor sits at the helm of the number-one ranked U.S. women's 470 -- a two-person boat that uses a trapeze and spinnaker and is one of the most physically challenging Olympic sailing classes -- and their trip to Europe gave them valuable practice time against some of the world's best competition.
"We struggled a little bit initially during the trip, but we finished with a 10th out of 60 boats in the Kiel Race week, so we were very excited," Connor said.
Kiel was host to a slough of former Olympians, including the Ukrainians, who won the silver medal in the last Olympics and are now the number-one ranked boat in the world.
Connor and Kratzig blew by them off the line in close quarters right after three of the regatta's starts.
"There are two other hot teams in the U.S. right now, but we're on top of both of them. We are right on track for where we want to be," Connor said.
Where they want to be is in Sydney for the next Summer Olympics, and it looks like they have more than a fighting chance.
Connor started her sailing success at Dartmouth as she racked up Women's All-American Honors in 1992, 1993, and 1994. As Varsity Team Captain she walked away with a spot on the Coed All-American team her senior year.
Connor campaigned for the 1996 Olympics but was only able to devote 4 months of training to the endeavor.
Kratzig sailed for Yale and also campaigned in 1996, but in one person Europe Dinghies.
Kratzig did not represent the U.S., but was chosen as the top boat's training partner.
Unlike other countries who choose their Olympians based on ranking, the U.S. has an Olympic qualifying regatta just before the Olympics in order to pick the team that is sailing the best right before the games.
The winner of the event represents the U.S., and both sailors' prior experience with the pressure of the qualifiers should help them when the time comes to decide who goes to Sydney.
Connor and Kratzig began their campaign after winning the 1997 International Miami Olympic Classes Regatta, the Miami Olympic Training Regatta, the Rhode Island International Sailing Regatta and securing their number-one spot on the 1997 U.S. Sailing Team.
This year, after placing 15th in the World Championships held in Israel, fourth in the National Qualifying Regatta in Kingston, Canada and a win in the Miami Olympic Classes Regatta this year, they hold the number-one ranking on the U.S. team for the second year in a row.
Connor is devoting all her time to the campaign now that she lives at home in Connecticut, having recently quit her job at a consulting firm in Boston, where she lived with three other Dartmouth sailing women.
Connor is now committing herself full time to the fundraising, physical training, sailing and leg work that comes with a successful Olympic campaign.
A typical day for Connor begins with a six-mile run, weight lifting and breakfast before heading down to the sailing center.
After repairs to their three boats and a tactics talk by their coach, the team heads out on the water for five hours of drills and racing before debriefing and heading home.
Right now the team is practicing in Newport, R.I., and Cape Cod, Mass., with the top men's 470 teams.
They have just returned from teaching a youth clinic in Corpus Christi, Texas, and are coaching New England youth teams.
The team does not have much time before they head to Mallorca for the World Championships and then go straight to Sydney for the Pre-Pre-Olympics, an event held two years before the games that invites the world's best teams .
With their busy schedule of international travel it will not be long until Connor finds herself at the shipyards again, waiting for another gigantic container with one of the two boats they have shipped to Spain and Australia.
"I spend a lot of time waiting here," Connor said. "It's not so bad. I've made some friends here."
