Congrats to the 11 SailStrong Opti sailors who qualified for the 2014-15 US National and Development Teams at Team Trials earlier this month.
National Team: Sam Bruce (2nd year), Maddie Hawkins, Walter Henry, Michael Pinto, and Thomas Rice (3rd year)
Development Team: Harrison Bailey, Jordan Bruce, Ian Jezak, Michelle Lahrkamp, Brendan Little, and Madeleine Rice
Enjoy the experience!
24 SailStrong team members attended the 2014 USODA Team Trials at Stamford YC May 1-4. The event presented a range of conditions with winds from 5 – 20+ knots, and strong currents from the tides on Long Island Sound. 9 races were sailed over the four days. The current lead to many more OCS and Black Flag penalties for being over early at the start than is usually seen in an event like this but the sailors that managed to start cleanly were able to maintain the best scores, especially with some sailors carrying multiple starting penalties.
Our sailors worked very hard in preparation for this event and positive results were to show for many of them, though we too fell prey to the starting penalty.
Maddie Hawkins lead the team finishing 14th overall and 4th place Girl. She was followed closely by Michael Pinto 16th and Sam Bruce 20th. We had 6 sailors in the top 50, 14 in the Top 100, and all our first time Team Trials sailors finished well even in the windiest conditions on the last day.
Team Results (217 boats)
Maddie Hawkins 14th, 4th Girl, Michael Pinto 16th, Sam Bruce 20th, Thomas Rice 27th, Walter Henry 43rd, JC Hermus 47th, Ian Jezak 59th, Harrison Bailey 61st, Michelle Lahrkamp 66th, Jordan Bruce 67th, Brendan Little 70th, Madeleine Rice 78th, Clayton Johnson 97th, Nick Chisari 98th, Dana Haig 114th, Reed Menszer 115th, Emma McInnis 120th, Chapman Petersen 130th, Jack Farrell 142nd, Torrey Chisari 145, Liam Randall 192nd, Colleen Obrien 197th, Harrison Menszer 200th, Brendan Lord 209th
We kicked off the “spring” season last weekend at Sea Cliff Yacht Club with cold and windy conditions. The kids did a great job in the challenging conditions and made a solid training session out of it. We are back to it tomorrow though the forecast is looking a bit better than last weekend. 
SailStrong team member Sam Bruce took part in the USNT practice last weekend at Lauderdale Yacht Club. Looks like the conditions were fantastic with good breeze, big waves, and warm weather in the ocean off Ft. Lauderdale. Sam sailed well finishing the race series in 11th of the 29 boats.
Opti Sailing in big waves in Palamos, Spain
Four SailStrong sailors headed to Spain last week for the Palamos International Optimist Trophy which each year brings together many of the top kids from around Europe. This year we had fantastic conditions with wind ranging from light to heavy and some of the biggest waves the kids will see sailing an Opti.
I will post some video later in the week of the conditions.
Thomas Rice lead the group in 35th of the 400 sailors, with JC Hermus 40th, Madeleine Rice 58th, and Michelle Lahrkamp 63rd.
Congrats to all our sailors at the Orange Bowl International Youth Regatta. We had 11 races in 3 days with unfortunately no wind on the last day. Thomas Rice lead the way for the team, narrowly edging out JC Hermus by 1 point to finish 4th. Very proud to have 2 sailors in the top 5 of such a competitive regatta. Along with Thomas and JC, we had an additional 4 sailors make the top 50 of the 240 boats, and 16 in the top 100.
A big congrats to Chapman Petersen for finishing 3rd in White Fleet. SailStrong has had a sailor on the podium in White Fleet at Orange Bowl every year we have been. It is always exciting to see the future of the class coming up.
Team Results (240 RWB Optis):
Thomas Rice 4th Overall, JC Hermus 5th Overall, Gray Benson 34th, Maddie Hawkins 36th, Sam Bruce 42nd, Brendan Little 48th, Stan Picard 67th, Harrison Bailey 69th, Madeleine Rice 70th, Alex Mazzeo 72nd, Michael Pinto 77th, Chapman Petersen 79th, 3rd White, Jordan Bruce 81st, Chase Carraway 85th, Nick Chisari 86th, Michelle Lahrkamp 94th, Caroline Benson 114th, Liam Randall 133rd, Matthew Monts 145th, Torrey Chisari 156th, Ian Thomas 160th, Vanessa Lahrkamp 170th, Justin Smith 190th, Adra Ivancich 223rd, Thomas Mazzeo 235
Each year SailStrong does a Holiday Clinic just before Christmas and Orange Bowl. In past years we have been in Miami, but this year decided to move up the road to Jensen Beach and sailed from the US Sailing Center Martin County. The venue did not disappoint, with 10-15 knots of breeze and warm temps. One of the best features of USSCMC is the ability to maximize the time of the clinic since transit to and from the sailing area is just a couple minutes.
We had three coaches for the clinic, Scott Norman, Juan Carlos Romero, and Peter Strong, along with sail designer Mike Marshall of North Sails One Design. This was a huge add on for the kids as they got to delve deep into the way the sails work, how they are designed, and what they can do to set theirs up to go fast for them.
Each year the our Holiday Clinic continues to grow with 24 for sailors this year from several different teams and areas of the country. Our first year had just three kids from our team and the two that have been to all three years of the clinic were happy to see the increase in training partners.
We worked a lot on starting and especially the boat handling and decision making that goes into, and it was great to see the improvement in the fleet’s general starting throughout the four days. Another focus was boat speed and Mike worked with the coaches and kids on the water with sails. We did lots of video of both the starting and boat speed which was a good help to the kids in understanding and applying what we were working on and talking about.
One of the highlights of the clinic was a talk Mike did for the sailors (and a couple parents and members of the sailing center) about the pictures and of the sails he had taken on the water. He talked a lot about how the foils work, and was able to line up different pictures of the sails to help the kids get a visual of what the different designs look like from different angles. One of the best things he did was give the kids an in depth look at what some of the controls do, focusing especially on sprit adjustments and how they affect the leach both upwind and down. Finally maybe some of them will believe the coaches when they are told that sailing downwind with a huge vertical wrinkle is not the fastest approach. Mike talked to the kids for at least an hour, and had them all paying close attention right to the end. If you have ever tried that you know it’s not an easy task. We will try to get up some video from the lecture soon.
A big thanks to Mike Marshall and North Sails One Design for supporting our clinic and making it a better learning experience for the sailors. Thanks also to the US Sailing Center Martin County for hosting us this year and we look forward to coming back soon. As always thanks to Scott Norman and Juan Carlos Romero for your work with the kids.
Come join us next year as we keep improving our Holiday Clinic to make it the best way to get ready to Orange Bowl, or break off the rust in the middle of the winter.
Holiday Clinic Practice Regatta Results
Here are some videos Scott Norman put together of each day of the clinic.
SailStrong Red (JC Hermus, Thomas Rice, Gray Benson, Maddie Hawkins, and Clayton Johnson) bested 20 other team to win the Lauderdale Yacht Club Optimist Team Race Championship. They had a tough first day, losing a few more races than they had hoped, and were sitting in 7th after 2 1/2 qualifying rounds, tied with SailStrong Blue. On Sunday they came together as a team and went on to win every race in the following 1 1/2 rounds before the finals. This put them in first on points, just one ahead of Coral Reef YC 2 and gave them a pass through to the finals. The next four teams would face off to get to the finals.
SailStrong Blue (Madeleine Rice, Michelle Lahrkamp, Jordan Bruce, Sam Bruce, and Walter Henry) had similar struggles on Saturday to the Red team, though they didn’t make their Red teammates too happy when Blue beat Red, the more experienced team. Red got revenge on Sunday though, giving Blue their only loss before the Top 5 eliminations. Blue came up against eventual second place finisher Coral Reef 2 in the Quarter Finals and lost the best of two series 2-0 and ended up 5th overall after losing a close race to Coral Reef 3 in the 4/5 deciding race. They showed great potential and came together as a team for the first time at this event.
SailStrong White (Alex Ellis, Nick Chisari, Torrey Chisari, and Jack Farrell) had a much less experienced squad but learned a ton at this event. They finished 13th of the 20 Teams, but are looking forward to improving their result at Team Race Midwinters in January.
Any Opti Sailors not making the trip to California this weekend, should take advantage of the long weekend and get three days of training in with Coach Will Brown. He will be doing a clinic at Little Egg Harbor YC on Long Beach Island, NJ with what is likely to be a small group. It is a great chance to get some one on one training time and a solid number of on the water hours. Please contact if interested.
SailStrong Youth Racing 