University of Ottawa Racing Team Off to a Fast Start

by Clarity Nicoll on 9 Apr 2010 Big things have been happening on the Ottawa sailing scene, as the University of Ottawa finally has its own racing team.

In the fall of 2009, Alexandre Gareau organized a team of excited students and had them sailing at the Ottawa New Edingburg Club on the Ottawa River. It started out as a sailing club where the students would go out on weekends and sail on Lasers and 420's, some students working towards earning their White Sail Levels. The support of everyone at the club along with the amount of fun the team had was enough to convince them to up their game and start doing some racing.

The uOttawa team purchased a small fleet of 420s and registered with Middle Atlantic Intercollegiate Sailing Association. Their first regatta was the North Spring Qualifier at Cornell University on Easter Weekend. Four racers made it down to Ithaca, New York for the race. The weather was beautiful, hitting 26°C, but also reaching 25 knots of breeze on the first day. One of uOttawa's team members, Rob Drakos was only learning how to sail and it was a great day to learn. The heavy winds were certainly not conducive to staying dry and led a lot of racers to capsize into the icy 5°C water. The second day of racing had much lighter winds and racing ending at noon after only two races. The University of Ottawa finished overall in 10th place out of 12 boats; not bad for their first regatta.

Congrats to Claire DesBrisay, Elizabeth Barr, Rob Drakos, and Alexandre Gareau on their first race with team Ottawa.