Field wide open for NSW Youth Match Racing Champs

by Jenni Bonnitcha/Suzzi Ghent, CYCA on 2 Aug 2005 Crews from three Sydney yacht clubs will fight it out this weekend at the Club Marine NSW Youth Match Championship for the opportunity to represent their state at the Australian youth titles in September.

This year’s line up includes five sailors who have represented Australia in three different events at ISAF World Youth Championships over the past two years and a number of champion dinghy and Governor’s Cup sailors.

Sam Boyd, girls Laser Radial representative in 2004, will head an all-girl crew from the host club, the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia.

Evan Walker and Kyle Langford, who won gold in Korea last week in the Hobie class at the Volvo Youth Sailing ISAF Worlds, have teamed up with keel boat sailor, Luke McClean, to also to represent the CYCA.

Nathan Outteridge, 2004 Youth Worlds gold medallist and competing in his first event since his car accident in January, will steer for a crew from Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron, while his winning 2004 Worlds crew, Iain Jensen, will work mainsheet for Jamie Woods with Nick Dallen on the bow, also representing the CYCA.

Jamie and Iain have just returned from the 29er World Championships where they finished a very credible sixth in demanding racing conditions. At the age of 15, Jamie is also the most promising young sailboarder in Australia today, finishing second in the 2005 Youth National Championships.

Another CYCA team, which also comes from the CYCA’s broad pool of match racing sailors, will be skippered by Jye Murray, the current Australian Laser Radial champion.

Consecutive Australian and NSW Youth Match Racing champions for the last two years, Seve Jarvin, Sam Newton and Robert Bell have stepped aside from this event, to instead represent the CYCA at an International Open Grade 1 event in France this week.

This has left the door wide open for the variety of talented young sailors who will compete this weekend.

Also included amongst the talent are three of teams of sailors who have just returned from the Governor’s Cup; the RSYS’s Stuart Pollard and Ben Barzach, who will be joined by Laurence Milne for this regatta, and the final CYCA team of Tom Barker, Will Ryan and Ted Hackney.

The Royal Prince Alfred Yacht Club in Pittwater will be represented by experienced match racer Hamish Roughley, who successfully defended his team’s Governor’s Cup title last week as sheethand. Hamish will be joined by crew Anne Durham and John Dahlenburg.

Recently appointed national umpire, Andrew Baglin, chief umpire for the event commented, ‘I am looking forward to this event, as it is undoubtedly the most competitive youth match racing event in Australia today.

‘With the champions from the previous two years not defending their title and such a strong field, I am expecting the umpiring to be very exciting,’ he added.

CYCA youth coach John Harris agrees, ‘young sailors from all high performance areas of the sport are using match racing as the discipline to hone their skills and broaden their horizons and this weekend’s sailing should be extremely aggressive.’

Racing will be held over Saturday and Sunday in the vicinity of Rushcutters Bay, on Sydney Harbour, with two round robins plus semi finals and finals scheduled over the two days.