International coaches arrive in South Island
by Yachting NZ Briefings on 1 Oct 2008
Opening Day, Nelson Yacht Club 2007. The club is one of several in the South Island who have engaged international sailing coaches. Richard Gladwell
www.photosport.co.nz
To develop junior sailing fleets and grow participation, full time coaches have started work at four South Island clubs.
Nelson Yacht Club has engaged former UK Laser Olympic Squad member Charles Baillie-Strong to build on the work that Mike Rudd did in the last two years in successfully building up the club’s junior classes. Nelson Yacht Club was the second largest represented club at the last P-Class National Championships. Charles is 25 years old, and was the Trinidad-Tobago Coach at the Laser Radial Worlds held in Takapuna earlier this year.
On 25 September Neeta Prasad-Angre will arrive from India to support
Queen Charlotte Yacht Club for six months. Neeta was the Optimist Coach to the Indian team at the Asian Games in Doha Qatar. Prior to the 2008 Splash Worlds Tobias Koeb coached the QCYC team of Scott Fyfe, Declan Burn and Josh Edmonds.
Tom Olds has signed up as
Timaru Yacht and Power Boat Club season coach. Tom is originally from Timaru, and won the Tauranga Cup in 2003/2004. He moved to Auckland to attend secondary school and develop his sailing, and was recently employed by North Sails. Tom’s task will be developing the Optimist, Starling and 420 sailing fleets.
Mount Pleasant, Pleasant Point and Christchurch Yacht Clubs have formed a joint venture called ‘Estuary Sailing’ to underpin their youth sailing initiatives, and are pleased to welcome David Fallon from Massachusetts. David has coached for ten years, recently with Optimists and 420s.
He will work with existing sailors within the club’s separate Learn-to-Sail programmes and with new sailors later in the season. Initially, David will be working with existing sailors, as the three clubs intend to continue to run their Learn-to-Sail programmes separately. Later in the season, he will inherit a new group of kids from the Learn-to-Sail courses. After-school coaching and trips away, including sailing camps will create an exciting summer programme for the
young sailors.
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