Helena's ready to race on girl power

HELENA Lucas will not only be racing for Great Britain at the home Games but she will also be representing ‘the girls’.

As the only female competitor selected to compete on Portland’s Paralympic waters in the 2.4mR one-person keelboat class, Lucas is looking forward to beating ‘the boys’.

“They hate being beaten by girls,” Lucas said of her international rivals with a grin.

“At the Hyeres World Cup this year it was hilarious, the first race was really windy and me and Meg [Pascoe] were first and second, they hated it.

“The only two girls in the fleet beat the boys, they weren’t happy with that, it was brilliant.”

Skandia Team GBR’s two top female contenders, Lucas and Portland’s Megan Pascoe, pushed each other all the way to ParalympicsGB selection.

Lucas, 37, who recently moved to Fortuneswell on Portland from Southampton to train for the Games, earned her London 2012 call-up in May after winning silver medals at two World Cup regattas and bronze at last year’s test event – the IFDS Worlds.

Last month, Lucas achieved silver at the Skandia Sail for Gold regatta – finishing on joint points with Dutch sailor Thierry Schmitter, who took gold overall.

Now Lucas, along with the rest of the British Paralympic squad, is training in Falmouth while the Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy is under Olympic lockdown.

But unlike some of her teammates, who wish to keep their heads down until racing begins in September, Lucas wants to relish every moment of the home Games.

She said: “I’m going to watch the Finn and Star medal races and I’ll be doing commentary on a Volvo spectator boat for the three Saturday's of the Olympics.

“I’m looking forward to it.

“Basically, I’ll be training during the week in Falmouth with the rest of the British Paralymic squad and then back for weekends. The Sonar guys want to shut themselves away during the Games, they don’t want the hype.

“I love the Olympics, I’m not missing any of it. The home Games is once in a lifetime.”

Lucas described securing selection as a ‘relief’ rather than a time for celebration.

She said: “Everyone was like ‘Oh, you must be so excited!’ but it’s not, it’s just a huge sense of relief.

“Like ‘Great I’m going, now I can really focus on my progress’.

“It’s just one step towards obviously the ultimate goal of a medal and preferably a gold medal at the Games.

“Although you’re really happy, it’s a case of: ‘Hold on, there’s a hell of a lot more work still to do’.”

Lucas has been training ‘pretty hard’ on Portland Harbour since March when it was so cold ‘it was a competition of how many clothes you could fit on under your dry suit’.

The former Olympic classes sailor, who was born without thumbs, did two campaigns in the 470 dinghy class before switching to the Paralympic classes.

She initially misjudged her disabled competitors having sailed against able-bodied Olympians: “I thought: ‘Yeah I’m going to clean up’ and I didn’t.

“I was like: ‘Oh either these guys are really good or I’m not really good’.”

Luckily it turned out her Paralympic rivals were good and Lucas enjoys ‘racing against the guys’ which she never could do Olympic sailing: “That does add another dimension to it.” Lucas, who has always been sporty, became hooked on the Olympics at the age of six.

As an observer on the board of the Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy, Lucas is proud that the 2012 venue has encouraged thousands of children into the sport through the Sail for a Fiver scheme.

She said: “What the academy has done to get the local children into sailing and out on the water is absolutely fantastic.”

Lucas described Skandia Team GBR as being ‘a big kind of family really’ and said: “It's a lovely team to be part of, so supportive and enthusiastic.

“There’s a really great team spirit, everyone’s always looking out for everyone else.

“You go to the gym and there’s always somebody there, which makes the gym session go so much faster.

“If somebody is doing a five-minute max test – where you’ve got to go as hard and fast as you can – everybody in the gym stops and starts shouting ‘Come on, come on’. That’s so nice.”

The Paralympics represents ‘unfinished business’ for Lucas, who finished seventh at the Beijing 2008 Games, after going in as one of the medal favourites.

Similarly the Sonar team of John Robertson, Hannah Stodel and Steve Thomas and Skud-18 competitors of Alex Rickham and Niki Birrell are also determined to banish the memories of not being on the podium of the last Games.

Lucas said: “The Paralympics team is exactly the same team that went to Beijing, when it went pear-shaped for us.

“We're pretty damn determined it’s not going to happen this time around.

“The whole Beijing thing will be forgotten if we all get a medal or gold at home in front of a home crowd.”

She added: “It’s so bizarre that here’s where we’re going to be competing at the Paralympics, yet I can walk five minutes up the road and go home for a cup of tea. It’s really surreal.”

Name: Helena Lucas

Date of birth: April 29 1975

Star sign: Taurus

Place of birth: Redhill, Surrey

Current hometown: Portland

Nickname: H, Little H, Helly

Who got you into sailing? My parents

Best moment in your sailing career? Sailing the Yngling with Annie Lush and Lucy McGregor at the Beijing test event and winning silver

If you weren’t a professional sailor what else would you be? Yacht designer/Naval architect

How do you progress from a club sailor to an Olympic-class sailor? Through the RYA youth system

What are your greatest passions outside of sailing? Spending time and sailing with Steve my husband, windsurfing and skiing

Any heroes? Lance Armstrong, Seb Coe

Worst habit? Talking too much

What word or phrase most depicts your personality? Bubbly

If you were a pantomime character who would it be? Cinderella

Do you have any lucky charms or rituals? I have a lucky DVD (Wimbledon)

If you had a theme song what would it be? Queen’s We Will Rock You

• The London 2012 Paralympic sailing events will run from Saturday, September 1 until Thursday, September 6.