Sail star Maggie has sights on top 10

Sole Shetland sailor Maggie Adamson on the water.

Sailor Maggie Adamson is hoping for a top 10 finish in Jersey as she competes in her fourth island games.

Adamson, who has also sailed with Team Scotland, started racing at the age of 13.

Now aged 23 she is the only sailor to be representing Shetland at the 2015 games and will be taking part in 10 races throughout the competition.

As well as a top-notch sailor, Adamson is an award winning fiddler and has been studying for her final year of studying music at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow.

For Adamson this year’s games is “one of the biggest things in the calendar”, though she admits it has been difficult juggling her studies, training and battling the winter weather.

Before hitting the water in Jersey she has been busy with onshore preparation and has a boat at Port Edgar near Edinburgh to put in the practice.

Adamson was also testing her skills in Shetland prior to travelling with the team down to the games in the summer.

She says she thoroughly enjoyed her time in Bermuda two years ago. “The atmosphere was great and the racing was great.”

She expects Jersey to offer up more wind, which will suit her sailing, however there will also be more of a tide to take into account too.

Sailing in Edinburgh should stand her in good stead, though “I think it should be quite comparable, especially in Edinburgh because there’s a lot of tide as well”.

When she is not competing she enjoys the freedom of being out on the water. But when fighting it out for first place, tactics are involved and there are lots of variables to consider.

“There’s always something going on,” says Adamson, with races lasting about 45 minutes to an hour.

“It’s 10 races for the one medal.”

And there will be stiff competition, Ynys Mon (Anglesey) had three sailors who have been in the Great Britain Olympic team she says.

“Bermuda are usually high up” and the sole sailor expects Guernsey and Jersey to perform strongly.

With a number of island games under her belt, Adamson has got to know a number of athletes over the years and seeing familiar faces is one of the great things about the games..

“The more games you go to then you meet the same people and it’s kind of a community.”

Even so, she will be putting those friendships to one side when it comes to competing.