Peter Burling (sailor)

Peter Burling

Peter Burling (right) and his long time crewmate, Blair Tuke.
Personal information
Born	1 January 1991 (1991-01) (age 26) Tauranga, New Zealand
Sailing career
Class(es)	49er
Medal record Representing  New Zealand Sailing Event 1st 2nd 3rd Olympic Games 1 1 0 Sailing World Championships 7 2 2 Total 8 3 2 Olympic Games 2016 Rio de Janeiro 49er class 2012 London 49er class World Championships 2016 Clearwater, USA 49er 2015 Buenos Aires, Arg 49er 2015 Sorrento, Aus Int. Moth 2014 Santander, Spain 49er 2013 Marseille, France 49er 2007 Auckland, NZL 420 2006 Canary Islands 420 2012 Zadar, Croatia 49er 2011 Perth, Australia 49er 2014 Auckland, NZL A-class 2009 Perth, Australia Teams racing

Peter Burling MNZM (born 1 January 1991) is a New Zealand sailor who won the gold medal at the 2016 Summer Olympics, and the silver medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics as helm in the 49er class alongside Blair Tuke.

Burling with Blair Tuke was Olympic flag bearer for New Zealand at the 2016 Olympics. They are just the 4th New Zealand flagbearer to win a gold medal at the same Olympics.

Burling and Tuke were named New Zealand sports Team of the Year at the Halberg Awards in Feb 2017.

At age 25, Burling is the youngest ever 49er Olympic gold medal skipper. He and Tuke won the 2016 Olympics with two races to spare and by an overall 43 point margin – winning by the most points of any sailing class in the Olympics since 1968 (when the modern scoring system started). They finished ahead of the second placed (Australian) boat in 11 of the 13 races, being behind by just three points in race 3 and one point in race 10.

At the 2012 London Olympics, Burling (then aged 21) was the youngest 49er sailor. Their silver medal was New Zealand's 100th Olympic medal.

Burling and Tuke were the first sailors to represent New Zealand in the 49er at the Olympics since 2000.

In November 2015 the International Sailing Federation announced that Burling and Tuke were the ISAF Rolex World male sailors of the year.

Burling and Tuke are the first sailors to win four consecutive 49er class World Championships (2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016). They won all 28 of the major regattas in the 49er between the London Olympics (2012) and the Rio Olympics (2016). The only regatta they did not win in this time was when they finished 3rd in a short 2 day regatta prior to the Olympics. In all the major regattas (Olympics, Worlds, Europeans, World Cup) in 2015 and 2016 they led into the medal races by over 20 points – effectively winning the regattas before the medal race.