Stipanovic, who can only be denied a gold by Australia’s Tom Burton and can finish no worse than second, guaranteed his spot on the podium on a sunny day with moderate, lightly-shifting winds and light waves on Guanabara Bay.
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Heading into the medal races on Monday, Australia’s Tom Burton took over the second overall position from five-time Olympic medalist, Brazilian legend Robert Scheidt, who was second overall after race eight on Friday, but dropped to fifth overall after disappointing finishes in the day’s last two races.
The 26-year-old finished the medal race in third as the Croatian crossed the line in ninth to give Burton top step on the podium.
“I needed to come third to win, and I could see in front of me there were three boats in front of me, so I needed to pass one”, he said.
“I was even talking to my coach before the race thinking “if we did this 10 times how many times would I be able to pull it off” and he said “nah 25 per cent”.
Stipanovic finished with silver and New Zealand’s Sam Meech claimed the bronze.
“We’ve got some more boats racing out there today so hopefully we can pull out more results and I can celebrate with them”, Burton said.
Burton admitted he was probably only a one in ten chance of getting the result.
Team USA’s Paris Henken and Helena Scutt won U.S. Sailing’s first race of the Rio Olympics after a victory in race five of the 49erFX opening series.
“I think it will be good to have a day off, reset and go into the medal race fully fired up and fighting”.
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Stipanovic, who claimed Croatia’s first ever sailing medal, said Burton had sailed well all regatta.
