(Rye, New York)- Peter Becker, head coach of
the Young American Junior Big Boat Team at American Yacht Club in Rye,
New York, reports how the success of their program begins with their J/105.
“American YC has had an active junior big boat program for generations
which traditionally overlapped with the eight-week-long junior dinghy
program. However, in 2013, Rob Alexander and myself teamed up to
supersize the program by expanding the junior’s racing season from
spring to fall, setting the juniors up to race against the adult-sailed
boats.
The philosophy was to do as much distance racing as possible and to
“hand the juniors the keys to the boat,” thus giving the juniors full
command (within reason). Peter and I figured that a J/105 was the
perfect trainer for the juniors, and Joerg Esdorn’s J/105 Kincsem was
available. The boat was purchased by a syndicate of members with the
specific intent to be exclusively used by the junior big boat team.
Young American became the boat’s new name.
The Young American Jr. Big Boat Team has 30-35 enrolled junior sailors
between the ages of 13-18. The team competes from spring to fall in
every race possible: distance races, one-design races, and club evening
non-spinnaker races. The boat is also sailed by the juniors in the
annual club’s weeklong cruise. Over the course of the summer, Young
American has been typically sailed in 50-70 race days, providing in
excess of 300-person days of sailing.
Some
of the great successes the junior team has had with Young American is
with distance racing. Over the last four years, Young American has been a
multiple winner of all of the various Stratford Shoal races. For
distance races, the boat is equipped with an A3 spinnaker and a second
spinnaker halyard. In 2015, Young American had a banner year, not only
winning the Block Island Race overall (PHRF) but also winning the
prestigious New England Lighthouse Series Trophy which is the
culmination of the scores from the Vineyard Race (1st class), Around
Long Island Race (1st class, 2nd overall) and the Block Island Race (1st
class, 1st overall).
The one-design racing has been the most difficult for the junior team to
master. Since we are rarely sailing with the same crew members with the
same lineup, each race day often presents a new set of training
opportunities and challenges. While this is perfect for creating
high-level training, it makes it very difficult to sail a series with
consistent finishes. To date, Young American’s best one-design placing
has been third place, which she has scored now in multiple series. The
junior team had a fantastic time participating in the 2016 J/105 North
American Championship held at Larchmont Yacht Club in an incredibly
windy regatta.
The Junior Sailing Association of Long Island Sound holds two big boat
races that are an all-junior event: the Dorade Race and the Beach Point
Overnight. The J/105 has become the standard-bearer and the go-to boat
for most of the junior programs so much so that despite the fact that
the Dorade Race is a PHRF event, the J/105s compete as a one-design
fleet.
Following
are comments and stories from some of the juniors who have participated
in the program (who are now graduated), and Carina and Collin who are
instructing junior big boat sailing at other clubs. Richard is hoping to
head to Navy sailing. The J/105 training prepared all who participated
in the 2016 Newport Bermuda Race as a predominantly junior crew sailing
High Noon, winning line-honors (1st in class and 3rd overall).”
Carina Becker, 2016 Graduate of the Young American Jr. Big Boat Team:
“My first time sailing a J/105 was around the buoys, competing against
our local J/105 fleet of almost 10 boats. This fleet is one of the
strongest fleets on Long Island Sound, and the fleet never passes up the
opportunity to race hard. Through the years, I have gotten to know many
of our fellow J/105 sailors. In particular, Paul Beaudin, our J/105
Fleet Captain, has always been supportive of our junior team and of
Fleet #6.
In 2015, Paul put together a crew made up from our local fleet to
compete in the J/105 North Americans in San Francisco. Being part of
this crew, racing with (not against) some of Young American’s biggest
home competitors was an amazing experience. While the North American
racing was cutthroat with almost 30 boats on the line, the way “Team New
York” came together to represent our home fleet shows the camaraderie
the J/105 community holds.
Having such an amazing group of sailors to race against has made my
experience in the J/105 outstanding. These boats, when used for junior
programs like Young American, produce sailors who love the sport for
what it is and what they want to make of it. I hope that more people
(and juniors) will join in with the opportunities and friendships
associated with a J/105 fleet.”
Richard O’Leary, 2016 Graduate of the Young American Jr. Big Boat Team:
“The J/105 acts as the foundation of the American Yacht Club Jr. Big
Boat Team. Most of what I know about big boat racing is attributed to my
first summers spent racing on Young American. The J/105 makes it
possible for a crew of predominantly 14- to 16-year-old kids to race
competitively against juniors and adults alike. The fact that Young
American has a tiller makes the boat more approachable for those of us
used to dinghy sailing.
Summer
racing means the boat sees plenty of use from the junior sailors, with
Can One Evening races every Thursday night and the Sunset Series on
Fridays, in addition to the many other races throughout the season. I
even had the opportunity to act as “owner’s rep” for the Boston
University Sailing Team on their training day for the Storm Trysail
Intercollegiate Offshore Regatta a few years ago. A 15-year-old teaching
college students about the J/105 was an experience that was bizarre but
rewarding nonetheless.
Whether two or twelve juniors show up to sail on a given day, and the
J/105 somehow manages to stay the perfect educational platform and a
really fun boat to sail.”
Collin Alexander, 2015 Graduate of the Young American Jr. Big Boat Team:
“The J/105 is an all-around perfect boat for juniors to learn how to
sail big boats and for junior programs in general. My experience with
J/105s goes back before my time sailing on Young American, where an AYC
member loaned his J/105 War Horse to the junior program. Today I think
so highly of the design of the boat that I recommended it to the
Riverside Yacht Club’s big boat program where I now am an instructor. I
am glad to say that they hooked one up for this upcoming summer.
The J/105 has a nice balance of sport and safety. You can get one of
those bad boys planing in enough breeze at the right angle. They are
super fun boats to race, and they are certainly not the “slow beasts”
that those that do not know sometimes make J/105s out to be. They have a
fair PHRF rating, and I can remember pushing ourselves to our limits
while we were distance racing, sometimes a hundred miles behind, knowing
our efforts would pay off. Not many ratings are like that.
On the flip side, I have witnessed a J/105 heel so far over that the
mast touched the water, only to right itself and keep on going. Our team
on occasion has been thrown breakdown after breakdown, only for us to
bounce back. One time, our main halyard broke mid-race on an upwind leg.
We sent our guy up there and managed to fix it with a temporary
halyard, and we finished the race with boats behind us. J/105s are
seaworthy, and I would be comfortable taking one the distance offshore.
They are solid boats and can be distance-raced, something that I found
to be very valuable for our team.
In
Long Island Sound, there are so many that one-design racing is popular
and super fun. I remember learning to get competitive and stripping off
all the extra gear and stuff from the boat, right down to the minimum
required by Class Rules. In a super competitive fleet, we still needed
more speed, but it gave our team a taste of what great one-design
sailing is really like.
It is small and simple enough that our team has been entrusted with
taking care of and maintaining Young American. I remember long and hot
afternoons out on the mooring with Capt. Becker fixing stanchions and
trying to figure out what in the world was wrong with our engine. We
repaired the boom on one occasion when it just gave out on us one day on
the water.
I am not trying to say that J/105s are unreliable…it is the opposite.
Young American is old, and boats break. Maintaining Young American
taught our team what owning a boat entailed and gave us valuable
experience with repairs. J/105s are an all-around type of boat. They are
good for buoy racing, distance racing, cruising and educating.
J/105s are also excellent cruising boats. Many of the memories I made
with my teammates were not in competition but on the Junior American
Yacht Club (JAYC) cruises that we went on. A bunch of us juniors sailed
the American Yacht Club cruise, which is a weeklong cruise, on Young
American.
We had lots of fun challenges that week which included not having an
engine for most of the cruise. We sailed from port to port making it all
the way to Newport, RI and back to AYC in Rye, NY. I was only 16, and
my parents trusted me with unsupervised overnights on the J/105, and
those were perhaps the most fun and educational sails of my life.
Imagine that, four boys cruising a J/105 down Long Island Sound with NO
ADULTS.
We were in heaven and having a blast of a time. This would not have been
appropriate on any other boat; but we knew Young American like the back
of our hands, and it was not the most delicate and expensive boat out
there either.
In regard to the Jr. American Yacht Club Big Boat Program, we had a
blast. It was led by my father, Robert Alexander, and Peter Becker.
Other adults definitely helped along the way. Doug McKeige, Mark Ploch
and basically every parent contributed. Those four were the guys who
went on the races with us kids. Each taught me to be a proper helmsman
and competent in every position. I would like to thank those adults and
especially my father; without him, our program would not have been
successful. These guys are some talented sailors.
You have to have some guts to head into certain danger with a bunch of
kids. I think of one windy overnight race when the junior team sailed a
New York 42. It was a crazy adventure but in retrospect, I can only
think of the adults who were willing to be responsible when things went
wrong. They must have had serious confidence in their abilities and in
our abilities as junior sailors.
The success of our team reflects Rob and Peter’s own seamanship. They
have taught us everything from navigation to spinnaker trimming. The
secret to our team was that we went out and actually did it, by
ourselves and frequently. It starts and ends with the J/105 Young
American— she taught us everything a junior needs know about big boat
sailing.”
Add to Flipboard Magazine.
(Ruskin, FL)- The U.S. J/24 Class is pleased to announce the launch of
the “Kelly Holmes-Moon J/24 Boat Grant Program.” This program is
targeted toward sailors in their twenties who would like the chance to
put a crew together and campaign a J/24 of their own, but do not have
the means to purchase a boat.
(Newport, RI)- Event organizers are excited to announce that
registration is open for the second annual New England J/Fest Regatta.
The regatta is being hosted by Sail Newport the weekend of August
12-13th 2017. 
We
tacked only once on the back side of the islands and set off back to
the Gate – we were with a group of eight or so boats. Fairly soon, we
set the A3 and not long after switched to the A2 which we carried all
the way to the finish line, with maybe five jibes to plug into favorable
current off Baker Beach and get around the South Tower. In retrospect,
we should have brought the big class kite – but prudence and previous
experience suggested that the class kite would be too much to handle
doublehanded, but it would have been faster.
Up
to eight races will be sailed, with daily prize-givings and “themed”
dinners every evening, and, of course, the notorious prize-giving party
on the final night- with local favourites “Joey-The-Lips” providing the
amazing, tub-thumping, slam-dancing, disco-madness soundtrack!
This
event also marked the third regatta for US J/70 Youth Championship
teams to qualify. In this event, there were three teams from across the
spectrum of youth programs in Southern California. They included the
HELLY HANSEN JUNIOR CREW skippered by Jack Reiter representing the host
SDYC; Luke Pierce sailing CAKE, representing Santa Barbara YC; and
Robert Garret skippering SLOOP JOHN B, representing Newport Harbor YC.
For these three crews, it was a nip and tuck battle all weekend long.
In the end, it was the Santa Barbara YC/ SB Youth Foundation crew of
high-school kids on CAKE (Lucas Pierce (skipper), Ryan Eastwood
(Tactician), Chris Kayda, Kris Ozolins, and Payne Donaldson) that
qualified as the top youth team from the regatta for the US J/70 Youth
Championship in Newport, RI this coming August. The SBYC/SBYF team has
been supported by CAKE’s owner, Scott Deardorff- also the Rear Commodore
of Santa Barbara YC. Here is Lucas’ commentary:
We
set up a practice schedule and worked mostly on our boat-handling. We
were able to do one local regatta in really light air. But, other than
that, we didn’t have any regatta experience in the J/70. 
Southern Spars named J/121 Spar Supplier
