National Qualifier for Laser and Radial 2010

8 sailors from Royal Van went to Kingston the last weekend in September to attempt to qualify for the national sailing team and selection for the Pan Am games in Mexico next fall.

The regatta saw decent breeze the first day and then real solid 25 kt breeze the next 2 days, the final day was light and we only had one race. In the end a excellent test for any one trying to make the national team, very little luck involved , just lots of time sailing and in the gym needed.

Luke Ramsay led the group with a 3rd place podium finish, Alex Heinzman ended 8th, a career best, Kyle Martin was top for his age group and completed a break through year with many races near the top 10, Kevin Greirson came back from sailing the 49'er and did well considering his absence, Chris Cowan took a little time from coaching Opti's and remembered how much work it takes to drag a Laser around ther course in 25 kts of wind.

Isabella Bertold won the Pan Am Games spot and secured her senior national team card by winning the event convincingly. Becky Power had a solid event finishing 8th in he women's and Joanna Moore sailed hard thru the event and was top for her age group.

Results are @http://www.cork.org/results_2010.html

This was the end of a long trip for assorted members of our team, the trailer went east the end of July and arrives back in Vancouver the first of October.

The team shared the use of the boats on the trailer and I commend the team with their spirit of cooperation

We stay in Vancouver till the end of the year and spend time in the gym training on the water only on weekends in November and December.

Al

Italian Match Race Championships

Alexander Heinzman, Kyle Martin, Eric Servais and Cameron Ho attended the Italian Jr match race regatta in Italy, here is there report:

We got invited again to attend the Italiana Cup Match racing regatta, this was my third year attending the event and second year skippering. For the rest of the team; Kyle Martin, Eric Servais, Cameron Ho; it was the second year attending this event. Kyle and I flew in directly from the Laser Junior worlds not giving us a lot of time to prepare.

The first race we sailed we made some unnecessary mistakes and thus lost our first match. We improved every match we sailed, and ended the round robin in third place; we fought hard in the semi final and led off the start in the first race, but got passed downwind by the British team, although we managed to keep it close all the way to the finish. In the second match, of three, semi-final we had a decent start and first lap, but lost distance when we had a poor mark rounding at the leeward mark.

The next day we fought for third place against the best Italian team. We won the first pre-start and led to the first mark, though we got passed downwind due to the fact that we did not notice the leeward mark was skewed to the wind. At the leeward mark, we forced them close to the mark and covered their wind, as a result we managed to make them do a slow speed, wide rounding letting us sneak inside the mark.

We led to the next windward mark and after a nice gybe set we managed to win the first race. In the Second race, we again led off the start and through an aggressive move by the Italians gained them a penalty though they did manage to take the lead by doing so and thus I was very surprised when they did not receive a red flag.

When they rounded the leeward mark, the Italians made sure that we didn’t think of going inside them again by shooting up into the wind as they rounded the mark. By doing this they slowed down significantly letting us shoot out underneath them when we rounded outside of them.

When we reached the port lay line they were too close for us to tack in front so we had to wait for them to tack first and go towards the mark. I was very surprised when they tried to give us a penalty and even more when they did their penalty and came back at us on starboard, but because of how we had positioned ourselves before they had completed their penalty gybe they did not give us enough room to avoid them and we had to avoid before they had gained right of way.

So we put up the Y flag and the umpire flagged the Italians giving them another penalty just seconds after they cleared their last one. We lead the rest of the race and ended up taking third.

At the end of the event I personally was very happy with how we had performed and I think the rest of the team was as well. We improved a lot throughout the event and considering how much preparation we had, we did perform well.

I would like to thank Tony Martin for coaching us at this event; his knowledge of keel boats was invaluable.

Laser Worlds 2010

We had six sailors go to the Worlds this year in Hayling Island in the UK.
Alex Heinzman, Ricardo Montemayer ,Kyle Martin and Ben Scott sailed in the Jr worlds (under 21). This is a new event for the Laser class and is run in conjunction with the Senior Worlds, where Mike Leigh and Luke Ramsay represented Royal Van.

These are some of the toughest events in sailing, the senior fleet is incredibly tough and just getting into the Gold fleet is an achievement onto itself. The weather was perfect with sunshine everyday, increasing thru out, with over 20 kts on the last day.

Our Jr team struggled after a solid first day in the lighter air, Ricardo hung in there the best and made it to the Gold fleet finishing with 23rd, Alex 64th, Ben Scott 79th and Kyle 70th of 120 competing. I think that we all learning a lot and that the team sailed better each day from the half way point on. The European style of racing is largely boat speed and good starting, this work ended up helping Alex and Kyle in the upcoming NQR's in Kingston.

The senior fleet is such a dog fight that even the slightest error of bit of lost concentration can cost you 20 positions, as usual the best of the best were competing and with solid breeze each day for 7 days. Mike had lots of high points but in the end couldnt convert on a few solid races and was below his goal, Luke came within a hair of making Gold fleet, (lost out on a count back), and finished in the top of the silver fleet. Final score- Mike 28th and Luke 63rd overall of 160 competing.

Results - http://www.laserworlds2010.co.uk/events/35495/juniors.htm
http://www.laserworlds2010.co.uk/events/35495/seniors.htm

Thanks to Lillah Martin for all the help at the house we stayed at. Good work to the whole team.

Al