Miami Olympic Classes Regatta 2010

The first of the World Cup of sailing regattas of 2010 was the Miami event. Royal Van had a good representation of sailors attending.

In the Laser class Mike Leigh, Luke Ramsay, Ricardo Montemayor, Alex Heinzman, Ben Scott and Derik Vranazan

They had the early start each morning at 11 and it was on the water at 9.30 , then sail out to the race course, the breeze was solid most days,(day one we waited ashore for a storm to blow thru and were eventually out on the water till sunset, towing back in the dark!)

There was a fair bit of hiking each day but never windy. The fleet was divided into 2 groups because of size (105 boats), so I followed the 2 starts with our boys split into both.

Mike , Luke and Derik had plenty of International experience and all had decent races with Luke leading the charge near the front of the fleet. Picking your way up the first beats proved to be very challenging and few got it right each time. The key was to be in OK shape at the top mark and have the ability to come back thru the race.

Rick, Alex and Ben gained experience and all had a few good highloight but eventually ended up in the Silver fleet.

Luke entered the Gold fleet in the top 10 and Mike in the mid teens, Derik in the 30's.

The Gold fleet racing is always great spectating, with many of the top 20 Laser sailors in attendance. Luke continued to battle hard and was rewarded with a spot in the final medal race (top 10 sailed a Medal race on the final day), he finished 4th in that and ended the regatta in 8th overall, a real breakthrough, his best major result after many hours of training over the years.

Mike was close to the medal race going into the last day of fleet racing but slipped a bit and ended the event in 20th, showing the toughness of the fleet. (Mike won the final event of the World Cup in Melbourne Australia in December).

The other class I followed later each day was the Radial where Jen Spalding was competing, Jen was in the top 10 all thru the week and was more consistent then many of the women. She climbed as high as 5th at one point and she too qualified for the medal race in 8th.
Jen sailed well in the final race and finished the event in 7th overall, an excellent result in a high caliber event,(the World Champion from last year was 11th and many of the top European women were there).

We had Zac Plasvic and Nicola Girke sailing in the RSX board fleets and given the lighter than preferred breeze for them , they faired pretty well, with both sailors in the early teens just missing the metal races. Zac was telling us the level of cardio fitness required for the lighter air they experienced during some of the event, some of the sailors getting their heart rates over 200 beats a minute. The commitment to fitness in this discipline is enormous!

Hunter Lowden, just recently, joined with Gord Cook from Toronto in the 49'er class. The team had sailed one event prior to Miami, the Worlds in the Caribbean, where they finished 21st (a excellent result!). They were in the hunt each day and had good consistency thru out. They qualified for the medal race and sailed well with a 4th , finishing 9th overall.

John Romanko competed in the Finn class and struggled with boat speed thru the week finishing a disappointing 30th overall. He continued to be upbeat and is working hard to get back on pace for the Finn Midwinter the next weekend.

Bruce Millar sailed in the 2.4m class and sailed into the top 5 a number of races finishing 8th overall, in a tough fleet.

We didn't have anyone sailing in the Star fleet but of note was Ross MacDonald's result at the recent worlds in January in Brazil: 14th overall in a very high caliber fleet!

Overall a successful regatta for the Royal Van team. Each one of these sailors are working hard to reach their dream of a Olympic Gold Metal and I was impressed with their commitment and determination.

Their were a few Royal Van national team members who weren't in attendance because of school commitments; Isabella Bertold and Alanna Vittery in the Radial and Abe Torchinsky who has moved to the Finn from the Laser.

Our next event is the Woman's North Americans and Finn Midwinter's in Fort Lauderdale in early February, then on to the East Coast Midwinter's in Clearwater Florida, in late February, (many of our development sailors will be at this event during the Olympic break).

Results are found at the regatta website- http://rmocr.ussailing.org/

Thanks again Royal Van for all the support.

Al Clark