This summer is off to a great start. It’s only the beginning of July, and I have already spent a lot of time sailing in many high-level events all around the country.
It all began with High School Fleet Race Nationals, the Mallory, in Cleveland at the Foundry. My Mater Dei High School team has been practicing all year for this event. High school sailing is a little different than regular regattas because it combines the scores of two skippers competing in separate divisions. My crew Kennedy Leehealey and I competed in the A division and my teammate Reade Decker competed in the B division.
The first day of the event started off with conditions similar to Southern California – light and shifty. The turning basin prepared me well for this venue. We sailed a good first set and finished with a one and a two. As the day went on, the wind picked up, and we did enjoy sailing in a little more wind. By the end of the day, my crew Kennedy and I were winning A division and Mater Dei was trailing regatta leader Antilles by one point.
Tensions were high for race one on the second and final day as only 8 points separated the top five schools. Things couldn’t have looked better when halfway through the race we had a large lead and the other top schools were deep, which would have given Mater Dei a nice overall lead. My excitement was short lived, however, as the wind shut off and the race was abandoned! Unfortunately, no races were completed the rest of the day due to lack of wind and the scores remained the same from the day before with Mater Dei just one point from first overall. While we were disappointed to just miss the win in the team scores, the good news was that Kennedy and I were recognized as the individual winners of A division at the High School Nationals.
Nearly a week later it was time to start my adventures on the East Coast. The first stop was the Brooke Gonzalez Clinic in Newport, Rhode Island. The clinic was organized so that we would have two days of training and then we would have a regatta on the third day. My crew, Kennedy Leehealey, and I spent our first two days training in C420s with kids from around the country. They were long, grueling days. The third day we had our regatta which we ended up winning in superb conditions of 13-15 knots. The best part of this clinic was the camaraderie, staying with sailing friends in Newport and building friendships.
After Brooke, I shifted gears to match racing and joined my team, Nathan Sih, Jack Flores and Sophia Pearce. We spent two days training in J22s in Newport, RI, for the Rose Cup (US Sailing Youth Match Race Championship). Our coach Albert Nichols was awesome, working us for 13-hour days, which my team really needed because we had never sailed a keelboat match race before. The training really got our boat handling sharp.
We then flew to Rochester, NY, for the Championship. The event started with two days training with the one and only Dave Perry. Talk about learning! Then, on day three, the regatta started with a double round robin for seeding. For us, it was good practice. We improved dramatically with every race. By the end we even took a race off the winner of the event, Jeffery Peterson. We were able to finish the round robin, seeded in fourth.
The next day we raced the fifth seed, Owen Lars, in a first-to-three knock-out. It was some of the best match racing of the event. There were plenty of penalty kills, and we were always overlapped at the finish. Unfortunately, we were knocked out and put in the lower bracket. We managed to finish the event in fifth. I thought we did pretty well for the event being our first match race, and we even received an invitation to the prestigious Governor’s Cup Match Race later this summer at Balboa Yacht Club.
After the Rose Cup, I flew to Stonington, Connecticut, for the C420 New England Championship. Kennedy and I managed to get one practice afternoon with our east coast team. Augie Dale was coaching us and four other east coast boats. The first day of the event was about seven knots. We sailed a nearly flawless day in the 61-boat fleet. We finished with a 3,2,1, and we were winning the last race, which Race Committee abandoned. However, Augie told us when we got in that we were OCS in the third race. I found that peculiar because I had an awful start, and I had video of it. We were clearly under the line. Also, there was another boat with a similar sail number to ours that was clearly over. I decided to file for redress. The jury determined that they called the wrong boat over and our score was reinstated. With the reinstated score, Kennedy and I were winning the championship by a few points.
The next day was not as nice. The wind was very light and unstable. We had a tough day. We kept ending up on the wrong side of major random shifts. Also, the other boats in the top five were quite a bit lighter than us. Even after such a tough day, it came down to the last race. Unfortunately, we could not match teammate Cordelia Burn’s speed. She managed to get around us and take the event. My training group swept the podium, and we were happy with our second-place finish.
The next day I finally returned home from my three-week adventure. Even though there were plenty of long days, I learned a lot, loved seeing friends, and it was a great start to summer. After four days of rest, Kennedy and I fly back east for more training, C420 North Americans, and the C420 Nationals. We’ll take a break back home to compete in the Governor’s Cup, and then head back east a final time to defend my US Sailing Double-Handed Championship at the Bemis in Marblehead.
It’s important to thank my parents, my sailing hosts in Newport and at Rochester YC (our friends from the NHYC Baldwin Cup!), as well as the BYCMSSF, which has really made so much of this sailing possible for me.