Belcher and Ryan win top sailing award

The 470 class world champions Mathew Belcher and Will Ryan have earned another accolade, winning the Yachting Australia male sailor of the year award.

The all conquering 470 class combination of Mathew Belcher and Will Ryan added to their overflowing trophy cabinet on Friday, winning male sailor of the year at the 2014 Yachting Australia awards in Sydney.

They have dominated the medal podium, domestically and internationally, over the past 12 months.

Belcher and Ryan's recent world title win earned Australia a quota place at the 2016 Olympics and capped off another extraordinarily successful year.

Their 2014 list of accomplishments also includes Australian and European championships, victory at the Rio Olympic test event and two gold, one silver and one bronze at the four ISAF World Cup regattas.

Those accolades came on top of winning the 2013 Australian Institute of Sport team of the year, and Belcher being named 2013 ISAF world sailor of the year.

The pair have been nominated as finalists for the 2014 ISAF world sailor of the year - to be announced in November.

Yachting Australia's female sailor of the year was awarded to Vanessa Dudley.

She completed her 18th Sydney to Hobart, finishing second on Syd Fischer's super maxi Ragamuffin 100, while achieving line honours and several race records on the boat in a number of offshore events.

Dudley was 2013 world champion in the grand master laser radial division at the laser master world championships in Oman, beating all her male competitors.

She also won the Australian title in the grand master women's radial in March 2014 and placed third overall at the NSW laser radial open championships.

Kurt Hansen and Harry Morton were named youth sailors of the year, having already made an impact in senior circles.

Hansen and Morton took out the open and youth divisions at the 29er world championships. They logged a series of other solid international results and dominated the domestic 29er circuit.

Morton also won the junior contender world championships in January 2014.

The sailor of the year with a disability went to the team of Daniel Fitzgibbon, Liesl Tesch, Colin Harrison, Jonathan Harris, Russell Boaden and Matthew Bugg.

The team of six beat Great Britain by one point at the IFDS world championship to be named the best performing national team across all Paralympic classes. Their results qualified Australia in all three Paralympic classes for the Rio 2016 Paralympic Games.

Competitor, designer and event director Iain Murray won the sport professional award and Bill Gale and John Calvert-Jones were recognised with lifetime achievement awards.


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