Round two of the NB SailSports Winter Sprint Series will at Georges River Sailing Club on Saturday 18th June.

The warning signal for the first of the three scheduled races will be at 1.00pm.

The Sailing Instructions for the event are HERE.

Entry is $20 and can be made online on the NB SailSports web site HERE or up to 11.30am in cash at Georges River Sailing Club.

Come along and get some much needed practice and potentially a flying start for the new season. Who knows you could be lucky and win a brand new Laser courtesy of NB SailSports. This is the main series prize determined by a draw with tickets based on performance and the number of races sailed.

Vanessa Dudley on the way to Grand Masters win

Congratulations to the 47 Australian Laser sailors who competed in the four World Laser World Championship events at Puerto Vallarta Mexico. Just over 400 Laser sailors from around the world sailed in the four events.

The Australian team comprised  6 in the Men’s Open and 2 in the Women’s. There were 27 Australian Radial Masters and 12 Standard Masters.

The Puerto Vallarta venue was ideal for these events with usually predictable sea breezes, great facilities and accommodation.

In the Open Men’s all six Australians qualified in the Gold Fleet with Mathew Wearn 4th and Tom Burton 5th in the 112 boat series. In the Women’s Ashley Stoddart was 22nd of the 71 competitors.

In the Masters Australians won 5 of the 9 age categories. Brett Beyer easily won the Standard Masters and Mark Bethwaite likewise the Standard Great Grand Masters while Gavin Dagley won the Standard Grand Masters. In the Radials Vanessa Dudley won the Grand Masters with Jeff Loosemore close behind, Rob Lowndes retained his Great Grand Masters World crown while Kerry Waraker fell just short of beating the true Laser legend Peter Seidenberg from USA in the Legends (over 75). Congratulations all.

You can see the post event Laser World interview with Vanessa Dudley HERE.

Standard Masters Australian Winners

The full results and documentation of these events is on the event web site HERE. There are many event photos  HERE.

ILCA has just announced The 2017 Laser World Men’s and Masters events will be held in Split Croatia.

The Open Men’s will be held between 5-12th September 2017 and the Masters between 14-23rd September 2017. For long term planning the event applications will open on 7th March 2017.

The 2017 World Youth Sailing Championship will be held in Acre, Israel from 8 – 15 July 2017.

If you are interested in selection to compete in this event YA have posted the 2017 Australian Sailing Youth Team Selection Policy for it HERE.

The new Australian Sailing NSW Laser Coach Tristan Brown has organised the Laser 4.7′s East Coast Championships at RPAYC from 11th – 12th June.
Tristan sees this event as a great way to provide 4.7 sailors with some big fleet experience and the opportunity to mix socially.

• The event Notice of Race is HERE.
• Online entries can be placed HERE.
• Venue information is HERE.

4.7 sailors – don’t miss this event.

50 Laser sailors did battle with the light winds on Middle Harbour completing two of the three scheduled races on Sunday 15th May.

It was a beautiful day if you discount the fading breeze which made it a late finish for the boats which were towed from other harbour clubs.

Logan Cortis won the 4.7′s on the day on a countback from Jack Littlechild. In the 25 boat Radial fleet Oskar Hansen just nosed out Zac Skullander by a point with Stuart Plenderleith in third place. In the Standards Nikola Churkoski  won from Mark Bethwaite.

The full results are HERE.

The next round will be at Georges River SC on 18th June with the first of three races scheduled to start at 1.00pm.

NB are again sponsoring the Winter Sprint Series this year at four clubs Middle Harbour, Georges River, Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron and Double Bay.

The ultimate prize of a free Laser trade for a NEW LASER is a big attraction to participate as every race completed earns a raffle ticket with the draw taking place at the final presentation.

For your winter diary the four rounds this year are;

• Round 1: May 15 Middle Harbour Amateurs – 3 races from 1pm
• Round 2: June 18 Georges River 16ft SC, first start 1pm – 3 races
• Round 3:  August 7  Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron, first start 11am – 3 races
• Round 4:  August  27 Double Bay Sailing Club, first start 1pm – 3 races

The Notice of race for the series is HERE. The Sailing Instructions for the first round at Middle Harbour are posted HERE.

You can enter the individual rounds online on the NB Sailsports web site HERE or with cash at the venue on the day.

Woollahra Sailing Club will be hosting a 4 race day, 12 race series over the winter months in conjunction with the WSC winter series 2016.

The Winter Blitz Super Sailing Series is for the International 420, 29er, Laser 4.7 and Optimist Classes.

Start time 10 am.

Dates: 29th May, 19th June, 26th June and 24th July.

Huge prizes, which include - WSC Membership for 1 year, one on one expert high performance coaching from our recognised class specialists, Clothing, Chandlery, Sails and much more.

Notice of Race and Sailing Instructions on WSC website here.

H2O have a few places left for the Kids Sailing Camp with coach Ryan Palk.

Ryan finished an impressive 11th at last year’s Laser Worlds and has a deep wealth of knowledge from campaigning for many years with Coach Michael Blackburn. Ryan is an exceptional communicator and excellent coach.

H2O Kids Sailing Camp 18-20 April
Laser Group: 4 places available
$357 Day Stay – for 18yrs and under
$575 Residential – for 14yrs and under only

Join these sailors who have enrolled for the camp; Jordan Makin, Noah Taylor, Paige Caldecoat and Lukas Lechner-Scott

To book or enquire, email info@h2o-sports-academy.com or call 0473 026 445

Manly Yacht Club are running the Helly Hansen Women’s Challenge on 19/20 March 2016.

Lasers will feature on 19th March.

All information is on www.myc.org.au HERE or contact Ivana Gattegno 0401025026 or ivana@imdesign.com.au

24 March is the application deadline for the following Laser World Championships:

• 2016 Laser Radial Youth World Championships (Dun Laoghaire, Ireland)
• 2016 Laser Radial Men’s World Championship (Dun Laoghaire, Ireland)
• 2016 Laser 4.7 Youth World Championships (Kiel, Germany)
• 2016 Laser Under-21 World Championships (Kiel, Germany)

To submit an application, go to the ILCA Laser World Championships website HERE.

Great event at a great club. The Metropolitan Championship concluded at BYRA on Sunday 6th March with 70 competitors enjoying great NE breezes with some challenging shifts to keep everyone alert.

At the conclusion the winners were clear. In the 4.7′s  Jack Littlechild from Woollahra SC, in the Radials Noah Taylor from Canberra YC and in the Standards Finn Alexander form Double Bay SC.

There was a good NE sea breeze however there were big wind shifts to be taken advantage of or to confound. Noah Taylor the Radial winner was asked what he thought of the shifty breeze. He responded that compared to Canberra, his home waters, the Pittwater winds were steady.

Prize winners Marlena Berzins, Jack Littlechild,, Finn Alexander and Nick Skullander

Finn Alexander the Laser Standard’s winner normally sails in the Radial but has been training with the Australian Sailing Team in the Standard rig and it showed in his domination of that fleet.

The top women sailor was Marlena Berzins from Double Bay SC. Marlena the recent winner of the Laser Women’s in the National Youth Australian Championship will be sailing in the Open Women World’s. It will be great experience and we wish her well for the event.

Thanks to the BYRA Club and its volunteers as well as our R.O. Col Chidgey for the great organisation of this event. Thanks also to local Laser dealer Sailing Scene for their support and prizes for the event.

The final results for the Metros at BYRA are HERE.

There are some photos from the event HERE and a slideshow by Warwick Crossman on Dinghy Fever HERE.

Because there will be a number of sailors staging away from BRYA we have posted our R.O. Col Chidgey’s pre-race briefing HERE.

There are currently no changes to the Sailing Instructions which are online HERE.

It will be a busy scene on Pittwater on the weekend on Saturday we will be sharing the waters of Pittwater with the RMYC fleets of Rangers, Jubilees and Coutas and their Classic Spin and Non-Spin fleets.  They will sail a windward/leward course to the north of us and, concurrently a classic yacht passage race which will finish to our south at RMYC.

On Sunday there will be a similar set of boats on a passage race again finishing off RMYC.  The combined dinghy clubs will sail their Super Sunday on their south Pittwater course which is the water to the south of our course area.  RPAYC has a Sail Expo and should have little presence on the water apart from clouds of their Lasers.

The first Warning Signal on Saturday is at 1330. Sunday at 1100.  Please allow plenty of time to get to the racetrack.  Saturday in the NE it should take some 20 minutes.  We’ll aim to do 3 races on both days, Huey willing.

YA completed a nationwide survey of sailing participation which concluded that 77,351 people were members of State YA’s and that 122,138 people participated in sailing 3 or more times in the year. 2/3rds of the 122,000 were male and 1/3rd were under 19.

There were 9,675 active support people to make it all happen 1,242 of who were paid. There were 117,000 people who participated in sailing promotion activities (like Try Sailing) in 2015.

More information on the survey is HERE.

We have a great line up of events for next season.

In NSW/ACT we will resume our normal arrangement running separate Open and Masters States with the Open State Championship at Georges River SC and the State Masters back at a favourite venue Great Lakes SC.

The season will kick off with the Coasts at South Lakes ASC at Sunshine on Lake Macquarie – a great club and sailing venue. The Metros will be held from Vaucluse YC and will have arrangements in place to allow sailors to stage from clubs and locations around the Harbour.

The Australian Championship, which is held in rotation, will next season be at Adelaide SC SA.

So that sailors and clubs can plan their next season’s calendars and programs following are the events and venues we will be running or are aware of;

• NSW/ACT Coast Championship – South Lake Macquarie ASC 22/23 October 2016
• NSW/ACT Open Championship – Georges River SC 26/27 November 2016
• Sail Sydney – Woollahra SC 15-18 December 2016
• Open and Masters Australian Championships – Adelaide SC SA 27 December 2016  to 4th January 2017. Promotion video is here.
• NSW/ACT  Masters Championship – Great Lakes SC Forster 18/19 February 2017
• NSW/ACT Metropolitan Championship – Vaucluse YC 18/19 March 2017

Another great event coming up, our final for Season 2015/16, should be a great one. The Metros are on at BYRA Bayview on 5th and 6th March. This is a great club and we will see plenty of action on the water over the weekend.

The BYRA club is located here.

There is ample boat rigging and parking at the club and SMS sign on and off will be provided for sailors who want to stage from other locations. See the SI’s for SMS sign on/off arrangements.

The Notice of Race is here and the Sailing Instructions here.

You can enter the event online here or up to 11.30am on 4th March at the club. Entry is $60 or $30 for sailors under 21 and we accept Visa, Mastercard, Paypal,  cash or cheque.