The sun set on the 2012 summer sailing season August 10.

Five sailors, representing both Rye and American Yacht Club, reached port with medals in their respective boat classes after racing in the Junior Sailing Association of the Long Island Sound Championship regatta.

 

 

By Alison Brett

 

The sun set on the 2012 summer sailing season August 10.

 

Five sailors, representing both Rye and American Yacht Club, reached port with medals in their respective boat classes after racing in the Junior Sailing Association of the Long Island Sound Championship regatta August 6-10.

 

“Champs”, as the regatta is called, is the culminating event of the junior sailing season. Throughout the summer, the Association hosts several regattas, in which boats from across Long Island Sound compete. The only way sailors qualify for Champs is by placing in the top third of the fleet in at least one of these regattas —not a simple task.

 

However, for local American Yacht Club sailors, qualifying for junior sailing’s toughest regatta presented no challenge. AYC sent a total of 20 boats — 420s, Laser Radials, Laser Standards, Pixels, and Optimists — to Champs, which included 20 sailors from Rye and ten from around the tri-state area.

 

Of the 20 AYC boats that competed, 13 ended up finishing in the top half of the fleet at Champs. In four different fleets of boats, Rye sailors received medals.

 

PD Duncan came in first out of 14 in the Laser Standard class. In Laser Radials, Sam Papert came in first and Collin Alexander finished fifth out of 49 boats. In the 420 class, Jared Gaynes and his partner Alexandra DelBello received an award for seventh-place (out of 48 boats). Lastly, Andrew Rochat and his partner Austen Freda came in second in Pixels, in front of 109 other pixels.

 

Typically, older sailors race in lasers or 420s, while younger sailors compete in optimist or pixels. At 420 and laser champs August 6 and 7, the wind was shifty, ranging from medium air the first day to light wind the second, when sailors waited for hours on the water for wind to fill in before races could start.

 

“It was very hard to be consistent because the wind was all over the place,” Laser Radial first-place finisher Sam Papert said. “You have a lot of mental games because when it gets like that, it’s really easy to give up; but if you don’t, you come out on top.”

 

While Duncan, Papert, Alexander, Gaynes, and Rochat held their course at Champs, Rye optimist sailors Carina Becker, Michelle Lahrkamp, Emma Jakobson, and Lindsay Powers raced against the best sailors from yacht clubs across the country at the United States Optimist Dinghy Association New England Championships August 7-9. There were 321 sailors in all.

 

Sailors who did not qualify to compete at Champs had the opportunity to race at the Alternate Championship regatta, which was held for Lasers, 420s, and Pixels at AYC August 6.

 

— Photos Courtesy of Brendan Rogers/JSA of LIS