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Canberra Yacht Club Sailing News September-October 2008 Olympians Enthuse Our Champions Olympians Enthuse Our of Tomorrow Champions of Tomorrow 1 An impressive audience of eighty five sailors and their families gathered at the CYC on 23 September 2008 From the Vice Commodore to give Olympic 470 gold medalists, Nathan Wilmot and Malcolm Page, a heroes’ welcome. Vice CYC Sailors’ Link with Vanuatu 5 Commodore, Anita Faulks, warmly Winter 2008 Racing Results 6 introduced the medalists, coach Victor Kovalenka and Michael Jones Another way to enjoy your sailing 10 (Yachting Australia representative), Changes to the Special highlighting the significance of the Regulations of Yachting Australian sailing team’s outstanding Australia in force from performance at the Beijing Olympics. 1 July 2009 to 30 June 2013 11 Australia’s world ranking in sailing is now second only to Great Britain. From the Manager 14 Michael Jones provided context to this historical success by recounting the story of how Australian sailors only commenced campaigning at the Olympic level in 2000. Notably, it was in March 2006 that Australian sailing has received significant investment and structured support, which has enabled it to further grow into a high performance professional sport. As an encouragement for our young sailors, Michael stated that sailing champions have attained their goals in different ways: some have been born with talent; others have worked consistently hard. An important lesson is that each has taken responsibility for his or her progress. Laughter burst amongst the audience with the revelation that disagreements are normal, even amongst professionals; the secret being good ‘relationship management’ skills! Contents ACT Sailing Inc Mariner Place Yarralumla ACT 2600 PO Box 7169 Yarralumla ACT 2600 The Canberra Yacht Club acknowledges the generous assistance of the Canberra Southern Cross Club Sep-Oct • 3 Nathan and Malcolm had different stories to tell about how and love of the sport; and the teamwork demonstrated by they turned their Olympic dream into a reality. Born into fellow Olympians. a sailing family, Nathan lived and breathed sailing since the age of 22 months and has since followed his father’s Our young sailors revealed their keen interest in learning footsteps in reaching international champion status. As about the secrets of the Olympians by asking questions, such Malcolm’s parents were not sailors, they preferred him to be as what is their ratio of training to racing, what motivates studious rather than spend endless hours out on the water. them to succeed, and why do they love the 470 class? Starting later in life than many who embark on the road to Ukrainian born and former Olympic sailing champion, becoming an Olympian, Malcolm first worked hard to save Victor passionately summed up the ingredients of the money to pay for his sailing campaigns. Although both medalists’ success, “the gold medals are for you, the sailors had traveled a long and challenging journey, they sailors here in Australia who love the sport. You will believed it was worth it (even the strict dieting!) to enjoy the succeed if you have a love for sailing. You will need to ultimate achievement of being an Olympic gold medalist. do two things though: build up your knowledge; and then Whilst they dreamt about reaching this ideal goal, the sailors sail, sail, sail!” have enjoyed the journey too. Contributing to their success are key factors: the talent of their coach; their determination By Antonia Kucza Sep-Oct • 3 CYC Sailing News From the Vice Commodore A very special welcome to all members for the coming 08/ • The School Holiday Sailing School has, yet again, been a 09 sailing season! We have a mix of new members (a very very popular activity for children to become involved in special welcome), members returning to the club after a the recent school holidays. period of absence (welcome back!) and those renewing If you have not booked a dinner seat for the Malcolm there membership for another year (great to see you Page night I suggest you do it sooner than later as this again). There are a number of keen, experienced sailors event is likely to book out early. This is an opportunity to who have just relocated to Canberra, don’t have boats have a good night out and support fund raising for the but are keen to land a (if at all possible) permanent crewing ever increasingly successful Youth Squad. Malcolm is one role. I have encouraged a number of these to come to the of the Gold Medallist’s who visited us in September. He is Sailor’s Cabin and place their name and mobile number easy to listen to, level headed and approachable. He is on the whiteboard under ‘Crew Available’. They are willing an excellent example of someone who has put their mind to jump into any boat at short notice – keep it in mind. to something and achieved their goal – persistence and We had 66 boats launch our Summer Series in Pointscore patience must be some of his virtues. #1 on Sunday 21st September with 77 signing on for the On the 2nd November we will be participating the NSW/ first Championship Race on 28th September. The wind has ACT Tray Sailing day. This is a day to share our love of sailing certainly enabled us to shake out the cobwebs quickly! with others. We need a range of volunteers for on water and A number of you have already signed up and nominated a off water tasks. Please refer to the volunteer chart outside date for duty; thank you. There are additional opportunities Carolin and Craig’s office. This day will be conducted for coming up that will provide you with opportunities to get to the public from 10am to 1pm. Wee have a Championship know fellow members. Please keep an eye out for emails that afternoon and are hoping to encourage people to and volunteer charts outside Carolin and Craig’s office. stay around, have lunch at the club and watch the race. Please grab a poster form the Sailor’s Cabin (Table inside The following are some of the activities the club has been door) and place it on your local community billboard. We involved in over the last couple of months: are also sending letters to the schools participating in our • We were delighted to host some of the Gold Medal School Sailing Program. Olympics Sailors on Tuesday 23rd September. It was great Let’s all make the effort each week to say hi to someone to see many of you there to support them. It was also we haven’t before. The club will continue to have its friendly terrific to see such a range of ages – it gives sailing hope reputation if we keep working at it. I look forward to seeing for the future. you all out on the water on Sundays and Wednesdays • We have just hosted the ACT Flying Fifteen Regatta (from 18th October). for another year. Congratulations to Matt Owen and In Sailing Andrew Reed for their success in this event. A special Anita thanks to the volunteers who gave one or two days of Vice Commodore their long weekend to help out. 4 • Sep-Oct Sep-Oct • 5 CYC Sailing News CYC Sailors’ Link with Vanuatu developed a school- to-school connection between Telopea Primary and Port Resolution Primary; her own students have enjoyed learning about Pacific Island children of their age. Antonia was interested in Susan’s experience, having previously worked as a volunteer for World Vision in Vanuatu. Two and a half years ago, Susan Alexander and Antonia Last July, Susan and Kaucz completed the Adult Sailing Course together at the Antonia were keen to Canberra Yacht Club. Since then the pair have become rekindle their connections with Vanuatu by returning to passionate about sailing, participating in local and national Port Resolution. Meeting with the Manager of the Yacht events. They have also become Associate Members of Club and the Port Resolution Primary staff, they learned the Canberra Ocean Racing Club (CORC) to further their about the challenges and potential opportunities for the opportunities in offshore sailing. During their brief sailing community. They also enjoyed the opportunity of taking lifetime, Susan and Antonia have found that a key attraction a class for a day to relieve the teachers who had to go has been the camaraderie and sense of community which to town to buy supplies for the school. Antonia was very sailors share both in Canberra and elsewhere. pleased to learn that the school had embraced and was Two years ago, Susan benefiting from a World Vision project she had designed. sailed to Vanuatu with An outcome of the project was that older children were members of CORC growing vegetables to sell to the Yacht Club and use for the first time. Her the money to pay for school fees, which is a big issue initial experience of facing many families. Susan identified the need for an the beautiful country additional building to relieve teachers from cramped was sailing into the conditions, and provide space for a library, computers breathtaking Port and school meetings. Resolution, Tanna Island. Coinciding with their visit to Tanna was the arrival of a As a teacher, Susan large fleet from the UK, France, Germany and the US all was very interested in participating in the inaugural round-the-world Atlantic learning about life as Rally for Cruisers (ARC – see http://www.worldcruising.com experienced by the /worldarc/). Susan and Antonia became acquainted with children, teachers and these sailors who were very eager to learn about the culture principal of the local of the Port Resolution community and make a contribution.

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