NYC Silver Panda wins US Team Racing Championship

by Marlieke de Lange Eaton on 19 Aug 2008 There were no major upsets at the U.S. Team Racing Championship over the weekend, when for a third consecutive time, and a fourth time overall, team New York Yacht Club Silver Panda won the event, hosted by Erie Yacht Club (Erie, Penn.) and sponsored by Rolex Watch U.S.A., Nautica, LaserPerformance, and Dry Creek Vineyard.

The Silver Panda team - made up of Pete Levesque (Tiverton, R.I.), Elizabeth Hall (Washington, D.C.), Clay Bischoff (Philadelphia, Penn.), Lisa Keith (Boston, Mass.), Colin Merrick (Portsmouth, R.I.), and Amanda Callahan (Canton, Mass.) - won US SAILING's George R. Hinman Trophy in convincing style, defeating British team West Kirby Hawks in Sunday's finals without losing a single race. Silver Panda has once again qualified to represent the USA at the Team Racing World Championship to be held in Australia in early 2009.

'This was a very competitive regatta,' said Pete Levesque of New York Yacht Club Silver Panda, adding, 'The fleet was very deep with a lot of high-quality racing.'

New York Yacht Club Silver Panda has dominated team racing on national and international levels in recent years, winning several major team racing events, including the Team Racing World Championship and the Wilson Trophy. They previously won the U.S. Team Racing Championship in 2002, 2006, 2007, and now in 2008. They will be looking to defend their World Championship title when they hit the waters off Perth, Australia, in January 2009.

For the second-place team from Great Britain (made up of Dom Johnson, Debs Hill, Ben Field, Tom Foster, Andy Cornah, and Hamish Walker), the U.S. Team Racing Championship served as a great trial run in preparation for their nation's World Championship qualifier scheduled for next month.

Joel Hanneman of Newport, R.I., has for several years been dedicating quite a bit of his time to help grow the sport of team racing, not only in his professional career working as an engineer for event sponsor LaserPerformance, but also as a driving force for the Rhode Island Team Racing Association (www.ritra.org). In addition, he has developed a team racing program for keelboats at Beverly Yacht Club in Marion, Mass. For all his efforts and his dedicated commitment, Hanneman was recognized by being presented with the Gay Lynn Service Award.

Complete results, daily reports, and photos from the event are posted on the event website at www.ussailing.org/championships/adult/ustrc. The U.S. Team Racing Championship for the George R. Hinman Trophy is part of US SAILING's National Championships series. For more information about these events, visit www.ussailing.org/championships.

www.ussailing.org.