Greatest moments in Otago sport - Number 15

Russell Coutts heads to victory in the Finn class at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. Photo: NZ Herald

No 15: Coutts wins Olympic yachting gold (1984)

There does not seem to be much middle ground when it comes to analysing the life and times of Russell - now Sir Russell - Coutts.

He has plenty of fans, who marvel at his achievements on the water.

But there are still plenty who have not got over his stunning defection from Team New Zealand a decade ago, and subsequent success with overseas America's Cup syndicates.

Some may even be wondering how Coutts' Olympic gold medal has made it into this series, given he had left Dunedin five years earlier.

Our feeling is Coutts is an Otago man, a proud Otago Boys' High School old boy who has given back plenty to his province.

And his decision to leave Team New Zealand, as painful as it obviously was for many fans, can not detract from his remarkable yachting achievements.

Coutts won the youth single-handed dinghy title in 1981, but really announced his arrival on the world scene when he won the Finn gold medal at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics.

He famously had to overcome a serious problem - boils on the buttocks - to complete the competition. His father, Allan, had the rather unpleasant task of lancing the boils every morning during the regatta.

Joseph Romanos, in New Zealand's Top 100 Sports History-Makers, described the scene on the final day of racing.

"There was drama . . . when his gear, weighed after the final race, was found to be too heavy. It required a long, nervous wait while it dried - and consequently got lighter - before he was declared the gold medallist."

Coutts later sent his gold medal to his old school, just bunged into an envelope and sent to Otago Boys'.

"I'd been badgering Russell for a while for some sort of memorabilia, but I didn't expect this," friend and Otago Boys' master of yachting Allan Garbutt said at the time.

"The package arrived and out falls this heavy big gold thing. It's amazing; an extremely nice gesture."

Coutts can now look back on the most remarkable of yachting careers.

He has won the America's Cup four times (with three different syndicates) and the world match racing championship three times, and was twice named world sailor of the year.

Coutts has also worked in yacht design, and was knighted in 2009 for services to the sport.