NEYYSA North Region Youth & Junior Team Racing at Ripon Sailing Club

 

A weekend of team racing, learning, skill development, friendship.

North East & Yorkshire Youth Sailing Association's (NEYYSA) second regional team racing champs was held at Ripon SC on 13 & 14 January 2024.

The drama started before Christmas when the event was over-subscribed! 14 teams applied for the 12 spaces advertised in the Notice of Race. After consultation with the experts at K-Sail the NoR and race format was amended to allow all the sailors to compete.

Thanks to Derwent Reservoir Sailing Club, Leigh & Lowton Sailing Club, Windermere School, Sedbergh School, Otley Sailing Club and Ripon Sailing Club 3 flights of RS Fevas were available. The 57 competitors arrived at first light on Saturday morning to help rig and launch the boats.

Racing got under way Saturday morning with the more experienced teams scheduled first each morning, the event provided commentary and coaching throughout the weekend to the less experienced teams so they could see what was involved and provide some key focus points for them to try and put into practice when it was their turn. This also helped parents & spectators follow the action and prompted lots of questions and discussion on shore. The aim of the event was to develop team racing skills in the region as a feeder to the national team racing events and several of the experienced teams who have several years of ET & NSSA events under their belts split up and brought in new, less experienced crews. The age range of sailors was 8-18, teams with U11s onboard could have a 3rd crew. The event ran an HLS round robin on Saturday to rank for a gold and silver fleet for Sunday.

The final match of the day, which was a re-sail between Mostly Newcastle & Oppy Blue following gear failure, provided the final round of drama. Coming from behind on the last leg, Mostly Newcastle caused a finish line protest which saw Oppy Blue doing turns. Mostly Newcastle crossed the line before Oppy Blue but one Mostly Newcastle boat possibly hadn't sailed the correct course during the incident so the finish boat queried the results and the umpires and race committee went into a huddle, eventually making a call to the RYA rules team for assistance. It was finally declared that World Sailing Case 128 was to be applied and Oppy Blue were the race winners, putting them 3rd overall with Mostly Newcastle 4th overall. A thrilling end to a fantastic weekend.

The association is hosting another Y&J team racing event in September and more information and an expression of interest form is available on the association website www.yhysa.org, the long running regional youth traveller series starts on 20 April at West Riding SC and entry will open shortly via the website.

Overall Results:

Gold Fleet

1. Top Hats

2. Pengwins

3. Oppy Blue

4. Mostly Newcastle

5. RipAss

6. Windermere A

Silver Fleet

1. Otley Red

2. Roa Island Fevas

3. Storm Seekers

4. SNOTtERS

5. Sedbergh B

6. Sedbergh A

7. Windermere B