ERIENCE - Sandringham Yacht Club

SAIL REPORTBandit - photography by John DynanSome notable changes in this year’s program are:• Wednesday participants welcome our new seriescoordinators Rob Sill and Paul Mentiplay who take overfrom Kate Mitchell. My thanks to Kate for her tirelessefforts with this Wednesday program over the past year.• Women in Sailing Challenge has a slightly amendedprogram that offers a variety of course types and againhas the option of competing in the Club’s Beneteaus.Competitors in this series will also compete for the newDoris Little Perpetual Trophy, generously donated by Dorisand Tim Little.• For the Saturday program, we have aimed to continue thevariety of race formats. The program continues to integratesome racing with our kindred club, Royal Brighton YachtClub, to provide an expanded fleet with the Peter Taylorseries. RBYC and SYC also co-host and run 3 races of thepopular Club Marine Series. This year the Club Aggregatehas been separated from the Club Marine Series for anumber of reasons, including member feedback that theAggregate should have a focus on club-based events. Thedecision last season to amend the divisional break pointssaw a change in the fleet mix that was well received andis expected to continue much the same for this season,except that Division 0 has been removed for club-racing,reverting back to a three-division format. Due to lowparticipation in recent times, there has been a formatchange to the Jisuma / Tam O’Shanter, moving from aFriday overnight race to a long-distance day race that mayextend into the early evening to continue the opportunity toexperience some racing at night.A reminder to all skippers that the Association Cup hasbeen scheduled for Sunday 18 March 2012 – a single dayevent. Although not yet finalised, there are indications fromRYCV that the format may be revised again to reduce theteam size to a total of four boats (2 AMS, 2 IRC) to makethe event more accessible to Port Phillip clubs. For SYCto win the trophy, we need to be able to choose the bestpossible team from the widest fleet possible, so please putthis date into your calendars.After last year’s very successful inaugural SYC CentenaryRegatta, we have scheduled this regatta to again bepositioned as season-closing event on Saturday 28 April2012. Offering a mixture of events including AMS/IRC shortcourses; one-design sprints; performance handicap fixedEntrantsmarks and Pursuit-start racing, we hope to attract a largefleet of boats from around the Bay. Racing will again befollowed up with some off-water festivities. Definitely lockthis one into your calendar.As reported at recent Ordinary General Meetings, SailCommittee continues to monitor metrics on participation inthe keelboat programs. I am pleased to report that recenttrends show a positive shift in participation in most series.The following graph tracks entrants:1009080706050403020100Sail Committee will continue to monitor member feedbackon our racing program, so if you have suggestions onfurther improvements, please contact either myself,the Boating Office or any of your Sail Committeerepresentatives.Finally, a thank-you to the members that continue tocontribute their time to Sail Committee - Ashley Trebilcock,Bruce Humphries, Daniel Pauly, Kate Mitchell, LowaPaszko, Marissa McManus, Peter Williams, Simon Grainand Terry Hall.Good sailing…Mark WelshClub Captain - SailWinners of State Titles held during theSYC Centenary RegattaSYC Keelboat Racing Program - Trends2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011Season endedSummer AggregateSaturday WinterWW SummerWW WinterTwlightSunday Sailors - SummerSunday Sailors - WinterWISCOne Design Sprints - Summer One Design Sprints - Winter6Summer 2011 | syc off the wind