RNZYS Performance Programme gets chance to prove itself in Extreme Sailing Series™
by Andrew Delves 6 Dec 2016 05:19 PST
8-11 December 2016
Frank Racing © Suellen Hurling / Live Sail Die
RNZYS Youth Training Program Graduate and recent WMRT tour card recipient Chris Steele will be joined by a crew from the RNZYS' newly formed Performance Programme (PP) for this week's Extreme Sailing Series™ Act in Sydney.
The event is hosted at the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron and will see teams compete in the one design fleet of foiling GC32s over a variety of courses.
The RNZYS team includes Helm/Skipper: Chris Steele, Mainsheet/Tactician: Graeme Sutherland (PP Coach), as well as the rest of the crew made up of Performance Program Members who will rotate positions - Logan Dunning Beck, Harry Hull, Tim Snedden and Luca Hyatt Brown, and Coach: Shane Diviney.
The team are up against some well-polished professional teams, including big names like Alinghi, Oman Air and Red Bull Sailing Team. With the team only having one training sail together in NZ before they left on board Frank Racing, they are certainly being thrown into the deep end. However they do have a depth of young talent on board, have been training for the last two months on RNZYS new foiling Nacra 20s and also have some experienced hands in Chris Steele and Graeme Sutherland.
PP Coach Graeme Sutherland is really looking forward to the squad having a chance to put the hours of training in the RNZYS' two full foiling Nacra 20s to the test. "It's such a great opportunity for the squad; we jumped at the opportunity to race these boats against the best sailors in the world. Being competitive in this series is a long term goal of the performance programme.
www.extremesailingseries.com