BY ANN DERMODY
thisboatinglife
Life Is Sweet On The Podium
They happen all the time, those kitchen-counter conversations between friends planning what they might do
together, if life didn’t get in the way. But most of those chats over coffee don’t lead to a podium place at one of
the biggest sailing races on the international calendar, or a shot at the Olympics
hough they were all pretty high up
on the amateur circuit, for three
sailing friends long past their college days and caught up in their
hectic middle years, the dream of
becoming A-list competitive sailors and harboring ambitions of going to the Olympics
seemed, in a word, unlikely. In fact, if
you’d put the proposition to BoatU.S. Vice
President of Government Affairs Margaret
Podlich, she might have burst out laughing. An avid sailor from childhood — she
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friends, but more importantly a team with
the drive to climb their way into top-tier
sailing, and take home some serious hardware, was extremely rare.
It was back in 2005, when an old
competitor Podlich had admired from afar,
Olympian Carol Cronin, called her up out
of the blue saying she was one woman
short for a sail that Sunday. “I didn’t say
yes right away,” says Podlich. “I needed
to check with my husband Steve to coordinate kid schedules. But he said, ‘Are
The sweet smiles of success: Kate Fears, skipper (L), Carol Cronin, Kim Couranz, and Margaret Podlich
combine fun with drive to land a medal at the Rolex International Women’s Keelboat Championship.
PHO TO BY ROLEX/DAN NERNEY
started racing in her teens, continued
through college at Tulane University, and
on into adult life. The mother of two had a
high-pressure career and a home life filled
with building a house, carpooling, and
extracurricular activities. That didn’t leave
much opportunity to indulge her passion
for sailing — at any level. So the odds, at
that stage of her life, of finding a group of
women who’d become some of her closest
you crazy? An Olympian asked you to
go sailing, and you’re asking me?’” That
sail, and subsequent ones, went well,
with a quick learning curve as well as lots
of good jokes and laughter, and by the
end of that year Margaret found herself
part of “Team Spidey” with Cronin and
another old friend, Kim Couranz. Cronin
and Couranz were also sailors from child-
hood. Cronin, a writer, young-adult book
author, and graphic designer specializing in
the marine industry, represented the U.S.
at the 2004 Olympics in Athens, steering
the three-woman Yngling keelboat.
