The weekend before Halloween, the Saint Francis Yacht Club hosted the 2024 Fall Dinghy Regatta. It was an incredible experience on so many levels and one of the biggest experiences for me and my new 29er partner, August Felgenhaur. August and I just recently began to sail together. In fact, we’ve teamed for the entire 24/25 29er Hamlin Series and this was our first ever regatta sailing as a team.

Olympian Paris Henken returned to SDYC in early October to coach an advanced 29er clinic with a stellar coaching team including her brother Sterling Henken, Noah Nyenhuis and B Lindsay.  Saturday’s focus was drills to improve down-speed boat maneuvering — a crucial skill for skiff sailors to be able to hold their spot on the starting line. Drill 1 - “The Glide” / Time & Distance, Drill 2 -  Rounding a mark without tacking, and Drill 3 - Quick double tacks. [If you are wondering how skiff sailors can round a mark without tacking, it involves managing your speed, communicating with your teammate on the right times to back the main and jib in order to move forward and then sideways and then sail backwards]. Sunday was a “Clinigatta” with seven races as part of the Luff-in Series won by Olympia / Maribelle Barelli, 2nd place was Kevin Cason / Holland Vierling and 3rd place was Sean Kaseburg / Braden Ozarski.

This past summer San Diego Yacht Club had the honor of hosting the 2024 CHUBB Triple-Handed National Championship for the Sears Cup. This event was a momentous experience made possible by long hours contributed by Junior Program staff, volunteers from our membership and SDYC staff on every level. The Sears Cup entry list boasted 17 teams, meaning 68 competitors, from 10 of US Sailing recognized areas across the country.

On August 1st, my skipper Anton and I got the opportunity to travel to Little Egg Harbor Yacht Club, in New Jersey to compete in the 2024 C420 National Championship. When we first arrived at the venue, we were greeted with hot and humid weather and very good breeze. The four practice days were relatively the same, starting out around 8 knots, and then eventually building to a 13-16 knot sea breeze. On the first day of the regatta, we experienced very similar conditions to the practice days, which allowed us to excel, achieving a 1st, and two 4ths.

My crew, Wyatt Kelly and I recently traveled up to Redwood City in the Bay area to compete in the 2024 C420 North American Championship. This was our second year participating in this event. 106 participants were registered for the regatta. 

Recently, my team and I attended the Rose Cup Youth Match Race Nationals. The event was held in Marblehead, Massachusetts, and spanned over five days. The first two days were composed of extensive debriefs, boat handling, and on-the-water practice. The priority was to get all the teams up to match racing speed. The renowned coach Dave Perry led the regatta and clinic teaching all the sailors the intricacies of match racing. Match racing in a nutshell is two boats that sail against each other with certain rules related to this style of sailing. Each boat sails against every other team in a round-robin series. After the round robin is complete, the top eight teams move to a quarter finals, then a semi-finals, and finally the last two boats remaining sail to the best of three against each other. 

This past week we, Julia Stewart and Bennett Simpson, flew as a team to Bristol, RI to compete in the US Youth Champs in the 29er fleet. It was a great experience and we learned many lessons from it. A few of our goals for this event was to go out there and have fun, work on communication, and get experience sailing in heavy breeze.  We both are so proud of how we have come together as team and have accomplished all of those goals.

We (Kevin Cason/skipper and and Holland Vierling/crew) recently attended our 3rd US Sailing Youth Championship, this year located in Bristol, Rhode Island. This was a super fun regatta for us.  So cool to see our growth as a team over the past 3 Youth Championship races. I(Holland) showed up sleepy after a long redeye flight, and immediately ran into the US Sailing Coaches -Phil and Rosie. They let me jump in their coach boat on the way to another race. An hour later I was competing in the Bridge to Bridge race from Newport to Bristol, RI on a Wingfoil - and I ended up placing 1st for Wingfoil!  What an amazing experience!