JibeTalk

JSA’s McIntyre Team Race Next Week

 

Junior sailors on the East River at last year's McIntyre Team Race

Sail in the McIntyre Team Race!

Whether you are a veteran team racer or new to team racing, the McIntyre Trophy Team Race clinegatta is the perfect event for you to kick off the summer racing season. 

The clinegatta takes place at SUNY Maritime College in the Bronx, New York on July 6 to 8, Monday to Wednesday.

Part of the time includes a clinic to enhance your team racing skills. The rest is devoted to intense racing on the East River. 

If you want to go, be sure to ask your club to make arrangements for its team of six sailors by end of Friday, July 3. The NOR is available here. 

If your club has enough sailors for more than one team, you may be able register two teams. Or, if your club does not have six sailors for a team, you may combine sailors from your club and another club to form one team.

The coaching team of three top-notch college coaches is a great reason to attend. Brian Clancy, head coach at Cornell University will lead the clinegatta, along with John Pearce from George Washington University and Chris Klevan from the US Coast Guard Academy. Biographies of these coaches may be read here.

All you need to bring is your personal sailing gear and lunch; SUNY Maritime provides equipment and 420 boats, and your club provides a coach with a support boat.

Do you want to compete in the McIntyre Team Race Championship? Talk with your head instructor and have your team registered by July 3. Or email to JSA office [email protected] to see if we can help match you in combined teams of six sailors from various clubs.

We'll see you at SUNY Maritime on July 6.

Big Winds and Fierce Competition Meet Sailors at JSA Laser/C420 Champs

Usually, it’s hard to find a good breezy day on the Long Island Sound, but at the 2014 JSA Laser/C420 Championship Regatta hosted by Shelter Island Yacht Club, the tides took a change with big winds, lots of waves, and fierce competition.

“It was really choppy out there,” Hector McKemy of AYC told me. “We had to get used to [the waves] fast when we got out there.” Conditions were fantastic, allowing the race committee to take full advantage of the two-day regatta, getting in 11 races for both Laser Standard and Laser Radial, and eight races for the C420 class. “We started late and ended late,” Connor Chapin, a sailor from Larchmont Shore Club told me about the first day of racing. “The race committee really knew what they were doing.”

Junior Sailors were grateful for the housing that Shelter Island Yacht Club members provided after a long drive out to Shelter Island by those who live in the western Long Island Sound area. At the end of the first day, sailors were drained from the grueling day of sailing, and most crashed into their beds before the curfew of 9:00pm.

The second day of races brought more wind and waves, with the race committee getting six more races in for the Laser classes.

“There was some great competition out there,” LSC sailor Alex Kirchgaesser said to me. “You’re racing against the top sailors in the JSA, so you know you’re going to have some good races.”

After heading back in on the second day, and after protests, food and ice cream sandwiches, the results were announced to a huge crowd on the main green of SIYC. 

In the C420 class, Will Gallagher and Jack Knowles from Larchmont YC took first place. In the Laser Radial class, Collin Alexander of American YC snagged the gold, and in Laser Standard, Will McKeige of American Yacht Club took home first place for the second year in a row. 

For full race results, please go the JSA’s regatta documents page.

 

6th Annual Jr C420 challenge regatta at SUNY Maritime

Patience was the key to the 6th Annual SUNY Maritime College Junior Challenge for Club 420 sailors. 

After a nearly four hour postponement the first of six races went off at 5:33 p.m. Thirty competitors representing Eastern Connecticut Sailing Association, Great South Bay Yacht Racing Association, Hudson River yacht Racing Association, Long Island Sound Junior Sailing Association and Peconic Gardiners Junior Sailing Association sailed in a steady 10 knot breeze. Each sailing association had three 420s representing them on windward/leeward courses in the East River between the Throgs Neck and Whitestone bridges. 

Typical of racing at SUNY Maritime College, race four was called off with one minute to go before the start to allow a barge to pass through the race course.  A special thank you to Maritime Sailing Coach/Bellport Bay YC Race Coach Zach Runci and The Waterfront Center’s Sailing Director Alicia Martorella for running efficient, quality races, including getting the sixth race off just minutes before the 7 p.m. deadline.

The Junior Sailing Association three-boat team from western Long Island Sound region won the day with best combined fleet race scores among the teams. Taegan Blackwell/Aisling Quirke of American YC received the best individual fleet score and Edward Lebens/Greta Farrell of the Waterfront Center were only three points away as second individual score. In the final race Julia Reynolds/Chase Reynolds of Pequot YC finished their best race of the day in the #2 position, gaining a 1-2-3 finish sequence for the JSA of LIS boats in that race.

For full race results, go to the JSA website regatta results page.

U.S. Junior Sailing Championships 2014 Preview

A talented collection of the top young sailors in the country have arrived in Northern Michigan and are eager to test themselves this week in single-, double-, and triplehanded competition on the waters of West Grand Traverse Bay. The Chubb U.S. Junior Championships is US Sailing’s most historic junior regatta. Racing at this US Sailing National Championship, hosted by Grand Traverse Yacht Club and Traverse Bay Community Sailing, gets underway Wednesday, August 6 and concludes Friday, August 8.

First sailed in 1921, the championship is recognized as one of the preeminent youth sailing events in the United States. Almost 900 sailors compete regionally to win a place at this championship in one of three fleets. Competing sailors range in age between 13 and 18. Each Area is eligible to send at least one sailor / team to compete in each of the fleets.

US Sailing Area B sailors participating in the event are:
- Triplehanded: Dwight Greenhouse, Collin Alexander and William Gallagher 
- Doublehanded: Matthew Kaplan & Sean Walsh and Timothy Greenhouse & Oliver Parsons
- Singlehanded: Jared Gaynes and Sam Morrell 
and we wish them the best of luck over the next three days.

Racing will take place in the Interlake, Club 420, and Byte CII. The equally matched Club 420 and Byte CII are supplied by Zim Sailing, one of the sponsors of the championship.

There are 2015 U.S. Youth Championship implications on the line this week. The top two single- and doublehanded teams not already qualified and finishing in the top 30% of competitors will receive early acceptance to the 2015 U.S. Youth Championships in a doublehanded boat of their choice. Teams must apply for the 2015 U.S. Youth Championship to be eligible. 

There is much more to this championship than racing. A one-day racing clinic led by US Sailing’s Junior National Coach Richard Feeny will be held prior to the start of the championship on Tuesday, August 5. Feeny will be joined by an impressive roster of coaches from around the country, including Cappy Capper (University of Minnesota Head Coach), Matt Lindblad (MIT Co-Head Coach), Mike Kalin (MIT Co-Head Coach), and John Pearce (George Washington University Head Coach). Instruction will cover charter boat assignment, rigging and handling of the boats, starts, and practice races. 

 

A College Sailing Night, sponsored by Gill, is scheduled for Thursday, August 7. This is a special opportunity for these young sailors to learn the ins-and-outs of college sailing and what it takes to race at the next level.  

For more about the Junior Championships, check out the US Sailing event website. 

 

Day-In-The-Life of a Junior Instructor

Name: Adriano Atallah 

Age: 15

Teaches at: Horseshoe Harbor Yacht Club Junior Sailing Program 

Resides in: New Rochelle

Sailing Experience: Two Years 

 

"All of our consulers in training are perpetually helpful to have as sailing instructors. Not only can they lend us a second pair of ears, eyes, and hands, but it also helps prepare them for the responsible role which they will presumably endow." Says Horseshoe Harbor Yacht Club Head Instructor Caroline Farina. 

For this article, I took a look at a day for Adriano Atallah, a Junior Instructor at Horseshoe. 

Adriano Atallah usually wakes up at 6am. Not because he’s he needs that long to get ready for the day, but because he’s studying Latin for school and Arabic out of interest. After an hour of studying, Adriano eats breakfast, packs his lunch and heads out. Commuting by bike, he leaves his New Rochelle house at around 8am to get to Horseshoe Harbor Yacht Club at 8:30. Then his work day begins. Campers arrive at 9am, so for the half hour before kids are at the club, Adriano and the other instructors get ready for the day. This could consist of planning the day’s events, cleaning boats, preparing sail parts, etc. When sailors begin to arrive, Adriano welcomes them, and then goes down to the docks with them to help prepare their boats. At Horseshoe Harbor, only Optimist and Pixel dinghies are available to sailors, and Adriano helps out with campers in the Optis. After a morning on the water, sailors and instructors come back in for lunch, which is usually spent just hanging out with the kids, playing Ping-Pong, cards, or foosball. After lunch, the sailors re-rig and head back out. “Out on the water, we’re usually practicing maneuvers and doing mock races,” Adriano told me. “Of course, we still leave time for fun. It’s not uncommon that the day ends with a follow-the-leader game, or something along those lines.” After derigging and cleaning up the dock area, sailors leave. However, Adriano and the entire instructor staff clean up the deck at Horseshoe, lock up the sailing equipment for the night, and after the clean up is done, he heads home. 

 

Don't Lose The Chute: How to Drop A Spinnaker

by Tony Bull, Bull Sails

Last week, JibeTalk brought you coverage of the annual Junior Safety at Sea seminar, hosted by the Storm Trysail Foundation. This seminar taught junior sailors how to pull their weight while working on a big boat.

Continuing with big boats, here's Tony Bull of Bull Sails explaining how not to lose your spinnaker sail during a race. Bull's article was also posted on Sailing Scuttlebutt, which is where I first saw it.

 

    A lot can go wrong on the race track and retrieving the spinnaker is one area that is fraught with danger and too often goes wrong. A successful drop relies on a few key points. It is a drill that involves multiple crewmembers all working in synchronisation. They must all be able to do their roles in the right sequence. So allow a lot of time for each to do their job.

One of the bigger issues these days is to find regular crew and this can be a real problem for a lot of racing boats. If you have a chopping and changing of the guard on a regular basis then it is important to have a default setting for your spinnaker work. This would entail a tried and true retrieval system that is fairly safe.

A familiar dousing technique enables you to incorporate a few newbies into their roles with a minimum of fuss. Be precise with your instructions of when and where they need to be and what they need to do and look out for them. You can work all this out doing very conservative spinnaker work as part of your pre-race drill. It still amazes me the number of boats where the first hoist of the day is at the first top mark. What hope has the newbie got?

I find when working up a crew of mixed competence levels it is always easier to just develop one procedure on most manoeuvres and then once mastered,differing systems can be incorporated. Most racing boats will have quite a few variations of spinnaker dousing they can utilise for different race positions. But all have a lot in common.

The crew must know their roles. Make sure all the halyards and sheets are ready for the job and will not snarl. There must be enough time allowed to enable the manoeuvre. Don’t rush it; snappy crew-work comes with competence, not with haste. Let’s have a look at a few different ways to drop the spinnaker. 

Check out a full list of recommended ways to drop the chute on Tony's blog, Bull Sails.

Sailors Learn to Stay Safe on Big Boats at Annual Safety at Sea Seminar

With Junior Race Week over, Junior Sailor’s attentions were on another event happening two days later. The annual Junior Safety at Sea seminar, hosted by the Storm Trysail Foundation.

The seminar is a day-long safety skills workshop that incorporates mini classes in the morning with a practical component on large yachts in the afternoon, where about 200 junior sailors practiced the skills they learned in the morning. 

The morning started off with a presentation by Boris Hermann from Hamburg, Germany- navigator of  “Maserati”, the upgraded Volvo 70 that is now breaking world sailing records. He told the junior sailors of his sailing journey from Manhattan to San Francisco, how he kept safe on the trip and how the feat was accomplished.

After the initial briefing, the junior sailors split up into four different groups – three of the groups went to classes, while the other group (The newly introduced “Level 200” advanced program for 28 junior sailors) took to the water immediately.

On land, sailors got to experience three different workshops, concerning working as a crew on a big boat, survival at sea, and how to recover a man overboard. 

Down on the docks, Peter Bauer, Ann Myer, Rudi Millard, Bob Behringer worked with junior sailors to rig a boat, and talked about the importance of doing your role out on the water. 

Inside the junior clubhouse, Adam Loory told the sailors about what to do in a man overboard situation, which was practiced later that day.

And inside the main building of LYC, sailors were taught about survival when out on big boats.

“I really found the survival at sea class (taught by H.L. DeVore & Gino Bottino) really interesting. They told us about how to stay in contact when sailing, and how to use what you have as remedies. It’s definitely something that I’ll use out on the water,” junior sailor Wynn Simmons told me.

After the morning, sailors headed out in 22 boats to race. Upon return, a pizza party was thrown. “I know I’ll be coming back next year,” Hector McKemy told me.

For more details about the event, read this earlier JibeTalk post by Marcy Trenholm and Lisa Schinella

 

Windless Conditions Meet Sailors at the 2014 Larchmont Junior Race Week

Competitors at the 2014 Larchmont Yacht Club Junior Race Week were greeted with rain and windless conditions this past Monday. The 375 sailors came into the club Monday morning looking forward to what is considered the most exciting regatta of the summer. However, it soon became apparent that the storms coming in would prevent the day of racing. “Bummer” was the general consensus of the sailors at LYC. The rain getting heavier and heavier, sailors were forced to retreat to the tents.

The second day did not present itself well to the junior sailors, either. While the race committee managed to get off one race, no wind and incoming storms prevented the sailors from staying out on the water.

However, while dissatisfying race conditions were a drawback to the day, most sailors knew there would be a silver lining that night at the “party of the year” – the LYC Race Week Dance. “Everyone knows about it,” LYC sailor Ryan Mattimore told me. “It’s even talked about during the school year.” The dance boasts a live band, great atmosphere, and nearly all sailors competing attend. The thunder and lightning did little to dampen the night, and everyone seemed to be dancing the night away.

Day three, 12 hours after the dance, sailors took to the seas for the first real-wind day of the regatta.
Most divisions got the chance to get two races in, bringing the total number of races to three. “It wasn’t the best conditions,” Austen Freda of AYC told me, “but it’s nice to get experience in all types of wind, even if it isn’t the strongest.” 

In the Laser Radial class, Collin Alexander of American Yacht Club took first place, while another American Yacht Club sailor, Will McKeige, took first in the Laser Standard class. In the 420 fleet, Edward Lebens and Greta Farrell from the WaterFront Center snagged first. In the Pixel fleet, the team of Harry Thompson and Matthew Viola from Manhasset Bay Yacht Club took first.

Full race results are posted on on the regatta documents section of the JSA LIS website (www.JsaLis.org)

 

2014 Storm Trysail Foundation Junior Safety at Sea Seminar Hosted by Larchmont Yacht Club

by Marcy Trenholm, Storm Trysail Club, and 
     Lisa Schinella, Storm Trysail Foundation

The Storm Trysail Foundation thanks all the volunteer speakers, boat owners, coaches and the staff of the Storm Trysail Club, Larchmont Yacht Club, and Junior Sailing Association of LIS for making this Seminar a big success.  The juniors were welcomed by Larchmont Commodore Rob Snedeker and Storm Trysail Commodore Nick Langone. Over 200 junior sailors and their instructors attended classroom, simulator, and dockside sessions in the morning, and sailed on 22 borrowed boats in the afternoon. Our guest speaker was Boris Hermann from Hamburg, Germany- navigator of  “Maserati”, the upgraded Volvo 70 that is now breaking world sailing records.  For the first time, we offered a “Level 200” advanced program for 28 juniors who sailed on Patriot, Strider and Troubador.  Video coverage was provided by Lee Reichart with Whitney Kneisley driving.   Maureen Koeppel photographed ashore and afloat. Special thanks to Storm Trysail Club's Marcy Trenholm and Whitney Kneisley, and the Foundation's Lisa Schinella. Special handouts and the “Winch Video” courtesy of Joe Cooper.

Thank you all!    Richard du Moulin

Speakers:  Boris Hermann (Ocean Racing), Gino Bottino (Medicine at Sea), H.L. Devore (Electronic Navigation & Communication), Adam Loory (Man Overboard & Recovery).

Simulator Coach:  Lincoln White, Sailing Director, LYC

Dockside Coaches:  Peter Bauer, Ann Myer, Rudi Millard, Bob Behringer

 

On the Water Practice:

Patriot (owner Steve Furnary) - Peter Becker and Buttons Padin, coaches

Strider (Andrew Berdon) – Andrew and John Browning

Troubador ( Jamie Andersonand Ned Weintraub) – Jamie and Chris Reyling

Lir (John McNamara) – John, Dick York, and Lawrence Cutler

Young American (AYC) – AYC instructors

Deviation (Iris Vogel) – Iris and Brenda Lewis

Sweet Lorraine (Mark Hanson) – Wilson Hunt and Todd Aven

Dash (Stamford YC) – Stamford instructors and Bruce Lebens

Melody (Alan Tannous) – Alan and Patrick Slattery

Soulmates (Adam Loory) – Adam, Gerard Girstl, and Bill Padin

Maudelayne (Bud Heerde) – Bud and Halsey Bullen

Choucas (Fred Cosandey) – Fred and Bob Behringer

Sunset Child (Marcus Cholerton-Smith) – Marcus and Wes, Bill Heinz

Morning Glory (Carl Olsson) – Walter Florio 

Celebration (Sea Scouts) – Kai Horan and Jon Ricci

Finale (Tom O’Connell) – Tom and the Young Mariners of Stamford

Bonzer (Peter Bauer) – Peter

Risk (Kevin Mackay) – Riverside coaches

Froya (Briggs Tobin) – Briggs, Charlie Gulotta and Ann Myer

Hurricane (John Schinto) – John

Inevitable (Sewanhaka CYC) – Sewanhaka coaches

War Horse (Port Washngton YC) – Mike and Alison Puleo

 

Hello from the JibeTalk Editor

Hello JSA of LIS Community! My name is Jack Belisle and I am this year’s summer sailing editor for the JibeTalk blog.

I’m a rising senior at Mamaroneck High School and I’ve been sailing for eight years at Horseshoe Harbor Yacht Club in Larchmont, New York. Last summer, I was a Junior Instructor at Horseshoe, and this summer, I’m really looking forward to writing and reporting for the JSA.

I've worked with the JSA before. Back in the summer of 2012, I made a video report covering the 2012 Olympic Sailing team send-off at LYC. The JSA took notice and gave me a chance to cover the Blue Jay & Pixel Race Week regatta at Manhasset Bay Yacht Club later that summer.

Over the next two school years, I was in a News Production class, practicing writing and reporting techniques. This summer I’ll be out on the water covering as many JSA events as I can.

Online social media is constantly evolving, so we may be experimenting with different forms of communication - be it a JSA Instagram presence, video reports and interviews, or communicating more via our Facebook page. That being said, we’d love your input – pictures, videos, stories, advice, or anything else – to contribute to making a great online community and resource for junior sailing in the area. We are hoping everyone – sailors, parents, instructors and program directors – has a story to tell and a resource to share, so do contact me at [email protected].

In the meantime, be sure to like us on Facebook. When I publish a story on JibeTalk, I will also update the JSA Facebook page, so you'll be alerted if you are a fan of JSA.

I hope you have a wonderful sailing season and I look forward to hearing your stories!

 

    Jack Belisle