After sailing together from fall 2007 to spring 2009 in 470 women’s two-person spinnaker dinghy, Tina Mrak and Veronika Macarol joined forces again in late 2012.

Mrak and Macarol called time on their successful career in early 2009, because of Macarol’s study obligations at Faculty of Architecture and stepped away from competition to focus on her studies. The sailor from Koper dedicated herself completely to the academic course, but admits that her own desire to compete again was fuelled during that time. Occasionally she took part on regatas of match race.

Mrak and Macarol had been having conversations over the autumn period about sailing together and started training over the winter.

The duo made their competitive debut at Split Olympic Sailing week in March and missed the podium at their first event together for one point. The season of campaigning continued with multiple successes at World Cup and World Championship level, finishing the latest on 7th place.

Mrak said: “I think we’re working well together and we’re learning quickly so it’s all moving in the right direction. We are quite satisfied with our progress so far.”

“We had a good year, but  it’s going to be a hard three years,” Macarol agreed with her eyes are squarely focused on the 2016 Rio Olympics.

The video below shows the beginning of their journey to the 2016 Olympic Games. It was filmed in girls’ hometown Piran shortly after the pair decided to hit the road for Rio 2016.