Page and Belcher look for award winning performance with Nicole

5:35 AM Sat 21 Mar 2009 GMT

'Belcher and Page with Nicole' Yachting Australia Click Here to view large photo

Reigning Olympic 470 champion Malcolm Page and new skipper Mathew Belcher have started a new Olympic campaign with a new boat with a new name: Nicole.

Page and Belcher have continued the tradition Page had with fellow Gold medallist Nathan Wilmot in naming boats after films starring Australia's Oscar winning actress Nicole Kidman.

From Bangkok Hilton and Dead Calm through to 2008 Beijing Olympic Games champion Australia, the legacy has continued with Page and Belcher today christening their new 470 Nicole, after the actress herself, during an Australian Sailing Team training regatta at Middle Harbour Yacht Club.

'This all started through a joke by a mate of Nathan and mine, he said we were so skinny we looked like we'd just got out of the Bangkok Hilton,' said Malcolm. 'We thought it was a cool theme and continued on with it from there.'

'When Nicole Kidman found out we were honoured and surprised with how she followed our results in the lead up to the games and even gave us a call on the morning of the first race in Qingdao,' he said.

Skipper Mathew Belcher is looking forward to spending a lot of time on the water with Malcolm aboard Nicole in the years to come.

'This has been a great tradition for Malcolm and Nathan and I'm honoured to be able to keep that going,' said Mathew.

'Hopefully the new boat and new name brings the same luck for our new partnership as we head towards London 2012 as it did for Malcolm and Nathan in 2008,' he said.

Page and Belcher will spend the weekend aboard Nicole on Sydney Harbour before loading the new boat into a container on Monday morning and shipping it off to Europe.

The 470 European Championships will be held in Austria in June followed by the World Championships in Denmark in August. Page and Belcher will also contest a number of ISAF World Cup regattas.

The Australian Sailing Team is the official national representative sailing team and is comprised of the best Olympic class sailors in Australia. Selected annually, athletes qualify for inclusion in the team by finishing in the top ten at an Olympic Class-World Championship, or be identified as having the potential to do so within a two year period.

The Team is generously supported by the Federal Government through the Australian Sports Commission, the Australian Olympic Committee and is a Tier 1 Australian Institute of Sport program. The Team is managed by Yachting Australia, a member of the International Sailing Federation (ISAF), the Australian national authority for sailing.

by Craig Heydon

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Page and Belcher look for award winning performance with Nicole

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