Sailing Magazine
Help These Olympic Hopefuls Raise Campaign Funds
With the short break in the weather pounding which the UK has had this winter, we took the opportunity to take “Betty” our newer 49er out for her first sail. Weather was perfect for this, and allowed us to add to the never ending boat-list to make sure all the systems are to our liking. With a 10-15 knot South Westerly we put Betty through her paces, with only one near capsize when Graeme got caught up in the spin halyard take up system during a gybe which coincided with a small whirly. But the mast didn’t get wet, so we not counting it as a capsize.
Looking ahead, we have a small training camp at Weymouth this weekend, weather dependent. This will be a good opportunity for us to line up against some good guys and see how our speed is relative to them. And then further ahead, the Princess Sofia regatta in Palma at the end of March which will be our first European regatta of the season. This will be our first step of the ladder in the build up towards the Worlds in Santander in September. It will be interesting to see how we stack up against the top teams in the world after a winter of training in the cold wind and rain of the UK.
In an attempt to raise some funds for our trip down to Palma, we are raffling off a Seiko Regatta leaders vest from the 2012 worlds signed by World and Olympic medalists, including Nathan Outteridge, Pete Burling who are also involved with the AC now a days. This is a great piece of memorabilia which can be put on display. We will be selling 100 tickets so you will have a 1 in 100 chance of winning it. The tickets will be R200 (£10) each. Please contact us (rsa49er@gmail.com) for the ticket number which you require, and how to sort out the rest of it.
Another positive is that the mornings are getting lighter. After the early morning cycle this morning, there was just t hint of light showing, even though it was an overcast start to the day!
A big welcome to Elvstrom Sails in Hamble who are helping us out with sail repairs! This is a big help when it comes to keeping our old training sails in one piece.
Thank you again for all the support from back home through the long cold winter training!
www.southernropes.com
https://slamuk.com/
http://www.elvstromsails.com/index.php/sailpoints-13/united-kingdom
