Olympic sailing course choked with algae

They might be hundreds of kilometres away from the smog and pollution of Beijing but Australia’s Olympic sailors are facing an environmental challenge of their own - green sea algae.

The team’s 470 men’s and women’s crews arrived in Qingdao, the 2008 Olympic sailing venue, this week for a training camp only to find the sailing course blighted by tonnes of the algae.

Astonishing photos taken by coaching staff show conditions that create the illusion the sailors - world No.1 men’s pair Nathan Wilmot and Malcolm Page and women’s crew Tessa Parkinson and Elise Rechichi - are training on a lush green lawn instead of open blue water.