At the beginning of this summer, we flew out to Bristol, Rhode Island for just under two weeks to compete in the 29er US Nationals. We flew out a week before the event to take part in the skiff Generation Regatta held by the 2niner squad out of Roger Williams University. RWU is a great venue where we rigged in a forest and raced just off the beach.
The Skiff Generation Regatta NE consisted of 3 days of racing with a total of 12 races. Each day we had different conditions, which made learning the venue tricky. With a deep channel flowing through the course and hills funneling wind, the racecourse was often one sided. By the second race in the series, a solid sea breeze had filled in, letting us stretch our legs and helping us work our way to the front. We stayed consistent throughout the regatta and finished in a solid first place. It was great to see the other west coast teams at the top with Peter and Anton getting second, and Sammie and Alice getting sixth. Overall, the regatta was an excellent intro to the venue and confidence booster for the Nationals. After taking a day off to explore Newport with the other west coast 29er teams, we spent the next three days practicing and continuing to learn the area for the Nationals.
The US 29er Nationals started the following week on June 25th. With a change in the racing area from the previous weekend’s regatta, the first day was a new set of challenges that we all had to overcome. After an hour under postponement on land, we went out and as the race committee was setting the course the wind built to a stiff 12-15 knots. With four races the first day, we sailed superbly to get out in front of the pack. The second day began with light winds while rigging, but once we got to the race course the race area fogged in and visibility was reduced to only around 50 yards. Again, we were in postponement until we could see our windward marks. Eventually the fog cleared and the sea breeze filled in. It was gusting into the high teens and with the current ebbing it created some large chop especially on the left side of the course where the channel was. The first race of that day, we rounded the first top mark first and held straight into the waves and as we looked back after getting settled, we saw first one boat, then another nose dive in the waves. At that point, we knew that it was going to be a fun day.
The third and final day, we sailed on the inside course because of the strong breeze that built early in the morning. We only had two more races to sail. Coming into the last two races, we had won seven out of the eight races that we had sailed to that point and knew that all we had to do was finish in the top ten to win. The first race we ended up third after an extremely tight finish with 4 other boats, winning the Nationals with a race to spare. The last race, we just went to have fun and rip around in the wind before coming back to the 6 to 8 knots here in San Diego and ended up in first, finishing off the regatta strong.
In the end, we won 8 out of the 10 races, won the US 29er Nationals and qualified to be a part of the Youth Worlds Team going to Oman in December to represent the USA in the ISAF Youth
Worlds.
None of this could have been possible without our training partners, without the support of San Diego Yacht Club, and without the High Performance Youth Sailing (HPYS) program at SDYC. We look forward to representing both the USA and SDYC in December. Thank you for the opportunity to represent you and continue to compete at the national and international level.