The 2023 ILCA US National Championships was a great experience. The regatta was held at the Crescent Sail Yacht Club/Grosse Pointe Yacht Club, located on Lake St. Clair, Michigan.
I flew in on Tuesday, 3 days before the regatta started. On Thursday I picked up my charter boat from the US One Design tent, and set up my personal gear like my traveler, daggerboard bungy, outhaul, and Vang. Then my team and I went out to sail on the lake. It was a very up and down wind reaching from 14 to 5 knots, and short chop. We did a few up downs and then connected with the team from GCYSA to do a few practice races. After that we headed in and got ready for the next day.
Last month, my skipper, Anton Schmid, and I went to Roger Williams University in Bristol, RI to take part in the 2023 29er Nationals and the US Sailing Youth Championships.
The 29er Nationals was a three day regatta that we were using as a warm-up event for the Youth Championships the following week as the Youth Champs was the Youth World Qualifier. Each day of the regatta, we were met with different conditions due to a large storm system moving through the area. The racing was very tight at the top of the fleet. Everyone was all over the place in the results. In the end, it was between two boats and it came down to the last race. We ended up beating the second place boat and secured our win at the 2023 29er Nationals.
The 2023 Youth Champs was an incredible experience. An amazing fleet of ILCA 6's with the best of the best youth sailors competing. The regatta was held in the Rhode Island at the Roger Williams College. The venue was a mostly enclosed body of water that had a mouth to the ocean.
The first and second days of the event were incredibly tiring. Gusting 25+ with an average wind velocity of 18. Boat speed was the name of the game; favoring heavier air I finished all top 12s in the big breeze. The courses were fairly short and boat speed was all that mattered. The wind would build and port tack was favored so the left tended to come in. During the downwinds, it was critical to keep the boat constantly planing and steering at steep angles to avoid running into waves. Keeping it simple and sailing fast was the recipe for success.
Kevin Cason and myself sailed at the 2023 29er nationals in June in Bristol, Rhode Island. Among the best teams in the country (and some from out of the country too!) we raced hard and made many new friends along three way! We finished the regatta in 6th overall and 1st in juniors/ under 16. We practiced for one day before the race and the wind conditions were relatively the same to the regatta conditions. We raced in a fleet of 20 boats and the line was packed! There were first and second row starts and as a result, making any mistakes would contribute to a low race score. Due to this we had some low scores on a fee races but we were pleased with most of the scores. All in all- a great experience at 29er nationals 2023 and I hope to attend and win 29er nationals in 2024.
I flew to Rhode Island to compete in the US Sailing Youth Championship with my partner Holland Vierling. The flight was 6 hours, which I flew alone to NYC. Then Holland’s mom Sabrina drove us to Roger Williams College in Rhode Island. We stayed in the Roger Williams dorm which was amazing because I had the unique opportunity to live like a college student. Similar to college life I made some great new sailing friends from Canada, who I plan to meet up with in the future. On our days off, we traveled to Boston and explored many Universities including Boston College, Harvard and MIT.
The first two days of racing definitely lived up to my expectations with wind gusts of up to 25 mph wreaking havoc on competitors, boats, and equipment. Thankfully, we were ready with spare equipment that we are able to use and lend to our competitors. Throughout the four day competition we improved each day and finished in 8th place out of 26 teams.
The overall experience at Roger Williams was amazing for two fourteen year olds. I am incredibly grateful to my parents and SDYC for their support and Sabrina Vierling for being my chaperone. Holland and I are already planning our return for next year’s Youth Champs!
We had the great opportunity to travel to Chicago, Illinois to compete in the Club 420 National Championship on Lake Michigan July 7 – 9. On our day of practice, we had 12-16 knots of breeze with 4-5 foot chop. We had never sailed the C420 in waves that big before. It was very challenging but an amazing learning experience. The regatta showed very hard sailing conditions with short and steep Lake Michigan waves combined with light winds to make tough racing. With really tough competition and challenging conditions there was a lot to learn and improve through the whole trip. Our best finish was a third on the last race. We want to thank comp fund for allowing us to always be improving and compete at this level.
Two weeks spent training and racing in Hog Island Bay for the 29er National Championships as well as the US Youth Championships brought a wide variety of conditions and great learning opportunities for our whole team. Carly Keiding, my skipper from SBYC and I have been together in the boat for about a year. 29er Nationals, sailed out of Roger Williams University’ beautiful boat house brought light wind and flat water, pushing us to focus on current and boat speed on the course. Following Nationals we had a few days of more light air training between the two events.
In February I competed in the 2023 ILCA Midwinters East, in Clearwater, FL. I woke up before the sun even came up and left to the airport. I Had a flight first to Dallas, TX, then a connecting flight to Tampa Bay, FL. Then I lastly took a 40-minute uber to my hotel in Clearwater. I arrived late at night, so I went to sleep right when I got there. The next morning, I woke up to the bright sun bleeding through the blinds and when I walked outside onto the balcony, I saw the bright blue water. To get used to the time being 3 hours ahead, my mom and I took an uber to the beach and walked to a lunch spot in the area. We ate lunch but then I remembered that there was a mini golf place on the way back, so we played mini golf and walked back to the hotel across a big bridge. While I was walking across the bridge I saw multiple lasers, IQ foils and a Nacra 15.
Over this past winter break, my family and I got the opportunity to travel to Miami, Florida for my first Orange Bowl Regatta. We arrived on December 18th for a pre-racing clinic, where I was able to get a feel for the conditions and become familiar with the area. I learned what the general conditions were for each wind direction and how to handle them.
Two days after Christmas, the regatta finally started. The first day was tricky. After being postponed for many hours we only got one race off. The conditions were shifty with around 5 to 8 knots. The pin was favored but it paid off to start at the committee boat and tack immediately onto port. The current was pushing you behind the line and towards the pin so there was a lot of line sag, which was a major aspect throughout the entire regatta.
In late December 2022 I competed in the 2022 Tuuci International Orange Bowl Regatta in the ILCA 4 fleet. Here is how it went. I took a redeye from San Diego to Fort Lauderdale, and then took a 30-minute uber to Coral Gables, where my Mom and I checked into our hotel room. Since I only got 2 hours of sleep on the plane, I took a nap. But then as a fun way to get out of the hotel, and to stay awake because of the time change, my mom and I took a hour long bus ride to the Everglades where we rode on an air boat to see alligators. However, it was very cold and windy, so we did not see any. But after I got to hold a baby alligator.
On December 24th my dad and I took a flight from San Diego, CA to Miami, FL for the 2022 Orange Bowl International Youth Regatta which takes place over the winter break. This was to be one of my last regattas of my junior sailing career in the challenging & large ILCA 6 (Laser Radial) class. Our arrival to Miami was not consistent to warmth of southern Florida in the winter time. It was cold, windy & wet. On December 26th, we went down to Coral Reef Yacht Club for registration, to meet up with my coach at Shake a Leg park and pick up my chartered boat. I then headed out for a few hours of practice with my coach. Racing began on Dec 27th in approximately 9 knots of wind that was extremely shifty. It was so shifty that the race committee was having trouble setting up a course of which they were only able to get one race off. For the racing on Dec 28th & 29th, the conditions were not only challenging due to the large fleet, but the winds was in the mid to high teens with puffs in the 20s, with a sea state known as the “Miami chop” which made an appearance. These were not the normal conditions I have been training for here in San Diego. The final day of racing was unfortunately called off for lack of wind. Overall, I had good boat speed, and I was unlucky to be called over early in a couple of races that hurt my overall score. I would like to thank the San Diego Yacht Club Competition Fund for their support in one of my last junior regattas. I look forward to representing San Diego Yacht Club for many years to come.
Thank you so much for supporting me in the ILCA 6 Orange Bowl Regatta in Miami, Florida. I really liked competing in these regattas. Competing against such amazing sailors really helped me improve. I enjoyed starting on extremely crowded starting lines because it helped me improve my boat handling. Speed testing with so many fantastic sailors helped make me faster. I was also happy because I was able to spend time with my friends. Although my performance at this regatta was not what I had hoped, I am happy that I was able to compete. Thank you for your support. I look forward to competing in more regattas representing SDYC.
This last week, we had the opportunity to train and race in the 49erFX in Miami, Florida. We had a total of 7 days on the water, four of which were training and three of which were the US Open Sailing Series regatta.
During the training, we were a squad of three ODP teams, one from Miami and two from California, coached by Dane Wilson. Two of the days, we also trained with Olympians, Paris Henken and Anna Tunneclif, who were wrapping up their winter training block and being coached by Charlie McKee.
Kevin and my trip to Orange Bowl to race 29ers was both an amazing all around experience and full of life lessons on adapting to surprises! We started out thinking we were ahead of the game because we registered to attend the pre-clinic. We planned to use this time to learn about the waters of beautiful Biscayne Bay. Unfortunately we were thrown a curve ball when Kevin caught Influenza A and was totally out for the clinic - and we barely recovered by the time the actual Orange Bowl regatta started. I decided to attend the pre-clinic - land portion and shared my notes with Kevin nightly. I tried to find a sub-partner using social media, and came close but it never quite came to fruition.
Last month, I traveled to Miami to participate in the Olympic Development Program (ODP) with my crew Holland Vierling, and we were there among 13 of the best teams in the 29er class from all over the United States.
The first day at ODP was different from our training in San Diego, we had lots of Olympic class coaches and three different meetings were scheduled each day.
The recent ILCA 4 Worlds in Vilamoura, Portugal, from August 13-20, 2022 was an amazing experience. It was my second world championship regatta as I also participated in ILCA Worlds in Dun Laoghaire, Ireland last year. The competition was just as strong this year with many talented sailors from 51 countries, including 272 boys and 152 girls who competed. The wind was really good on some days, but not so much on others.
Last month we traveled to El Balis, outside of Barcelona, Spain, for the 29er Open Worlds. Two hundred forty-two teams from 26 countries came for the racing held August 1-6. There were three days of qualifying and 3 days of final racing.
It was very difficult sailing conditions for us with super light winds and massive chop. Many days the wind came out of the opposite directions from the day before.
Unfortunately, none of the San Diego Yacht Club teams made it into Gold Fleet this year. In the finals Anton and Peter Joslin top finishes included a bullet and a fourth, but also a UFD (42), to finish 49th overall and 9th in Silver out of 40 boats. Alice and Sammie Gardner top finishes included a 4th and a 9th, for an overall finish of 56 and a 16th out of 40 in Silver.
This year our results were disappointing, but nonetheless we learned so much through the racing and from the amazing coaches. I want to thank comp fund for allowing us to have this opportunity.
On August 9th I took a flight from San Diego, CA to Faro, Portugal for the 2022 ILCA 4 (Laser 4.7) World Championships which were to take place a short distance away in Vilamoura, Portugal. I arrived a few days early in order to get acclimated to the time difference as well as get a couple of practice sailing sessions in with the USA Team and Coaches (Steve Mitchell, Pedro Mascarenhas, & Marie Barrue) prior to the beginning of the regatta.
The Govenor’s Cup is one of the showcase events for youth match racing. Due to its ability to accept more than one team per nation, many regard it as more prestigious than Youth Match Racing Worlds. Hosted by Balboa Yacht Club each year in custom made “Gov Cup 22s,” acceptance is by application only and entries are capped at 12. This past July, I was fortunate enough to participate in this event for the second time.
This summer, Peter Busch and I traveled to Canada to compete in the C420 North Americans. I was excited to compete in this event because it was my first time traveling to Canada. We arrived at the Buffalo Canoe Club on July 25th to warm up and learn more about the venue. After sailing in the C420 nationals earlier in the summer, we knew that we struggled in the waves due to our minimal time sailing in those conditions, so practice time on Lake Erie was crucial. After our practice session, we heard roomers that storm systems might be rolling through during our race days, so we started preparing for a regatta filled with chop and heavy breeze.