aldeburgh yacht club junior regatta

Junior and Youth Regatta Week

The Aldeburgh Yacht Club is looking forward to hosting the Junior and Youth Regatta Week, a must-attend event for young sailors eager to showcase their skills on the water. From August 11th to August 15th, 2024, participants will have the chance to compete in various categories and race against their peers.

In addition to the thrilling races, the Regatta Week will also feature social activities and training sessions, providing a well-rounded experience for everyone involved. It's not just about winning; it's about enjoying the camaraderie and passion for sailing with like-minded individuals.

If you're ready to hoist your sails and join in on the fun, head over to the JYR Noticeboard to access the Entry Form and Notice of Race. Make sure to complete the registration process promptly to secure your spot in this exciting event.

This is your opportunity to be part of something special. Come and be a part of the Aldeburgh Yacht Club's Junior and Youth Regatta Week, where you can create lasting memories and sail your way to victory on the waters of Suffolk.

For any inquiries or further details, feel free to get in touch with the club manager via email at [email protected] or give them a call at 01728 452562.

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Aldeburgh Regatta 2024

August 18 - august 23.

More details coming soon, visit https://www.aldeburghyc.org.uk/

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St. Pete To Shine Again

• By Dave Reed
• February 14, 2024

The St. Petersburg Yacht Club and the western shore of Florida’s Tampa Bay will be the epicenter of sailboat racing this weekend when more than 240 teams across 13 one-design classes and five handicap-racing fleets get races started for the first event of the national Helly Hansen Sailing World Regatta Series in St. Petersburg . Now well into its third decade, the regatta will also mark 10 years with its title sponsor.

The Sunshine City’s motto is that St. Pete is “Always in Season,” and that is certainly the enticement for many teams traveling in from colder climes with the promise of warm breezes, stiff competition and a nightlife that’s never been more vibrant.

One such northerner is David Mierzwa, of Lake Placid, New York, who on Tuesday was behind the wheel and racing to get south of a big storm burying the mid-Atlantic and Northeast in snow and ice. Behind him was bitter cold, but ahead of him was warmth and the anticipation of his first Melges 24 Midwinter Championship at the regatta.

As a newbie to the demanding Melges 24, Mierzwa says his primary goal is to “stay out of everybody’s way,” but ultimately, he and his teammates are on a mission to learn the nuances of this high-performance keelboat from his peers.

“We’re going so we can hunt for tips, tricks and whatever makes us better,” Mierzwa says. “It’s about having the opportunity to do an event of this caliber with likeminded people, because while sailing is the goal, being surrounded by others that do the same sport is sometimes better than the sport itself.”

As the Helly Hansen Sailing World Regatta in St. Petersburg will be his team’s first major event, he recognizes they don’t have a high enough racing pedigree to vie for the Midwinter Championship title—yet. “The only way we can get to that point is to go out there and race,” he says.

And race they will, from early Friday morning through late Sunday, alongside several other one-design classes that are the regulars of this February classic, including the S2 7.9s and the Hobie 33s , both of which will also be vying for their midwinter championship titles. 

The S2s have the returning champions of Tom and Mary Bryant’s “Team Matros” from Holland, Michigan, which won seven of eight races in 2023 to earn their berth at the Helly Hansen Sailing World Caribbean Championship last October. At each of the series’ five events one team is selected to compete in the British Virgin Islands for the overall season title.

The Hobie 33s also have their champions returning to defend— Craig and Deborah Wilusz’s “Hoof Hearted”—but this year there’s a new and unknown challenger from Waxhaw, North Carolina, and it’s a boat with a nefarious name: “Bad Bunny.” Its new owner, Sean Rhone, says he’s looking forward to meeting and racing with other Hobie 33 owners for the first time and “taking a peek under their hoods.”

Rhone has been primarily racing his Hobie 33 in singlehanded events and low-key races on North Carolina’s Lake Norman, and like Mierzwa, he’s not sure how well he’ll fare, especially with a five-person team that’s been assembled by way of social media message boards, and whom he’s never met.

“It’s cold in Charlotte,” Rhone says, “and I’m getting tired of the cold weather, so when I saw that the fleet was having its midwinters in St. Petersburg, I thought it would be nice to go and race against some other Hobie 33s for once.”

Mierzwa and Rhone may pass each other on an interstate somewhere on the way to St. Pete, along with a sizable Canadian contingent of Contender dinghy sailors making their annual pilgrimage from across the northern border. The 16-foot Contender, which its loyalists claim to be “The Sexiest Singlehander in the World ” was introduced in 1969 and continues to be popular internationally, as well as in Tampa thanks to local sailmaker Ethan Bixby. Bixby, a champion of many classes, continues to rally the troops to the Helly Hansen Sailing World Regatta and the fleet has doubled for this year’s gathering. Bixby, who won all races last year, will of course be among the 11 trapezing sailors.

Sharing the same racecourse will be eight teams racing the doublehanded Windmill class, which is new to the regatta lineup, but another cult classic sparked in the 1950s. Class measurer Pat Huntley, of Erie, Pennsylvania, is now a decade into Windmill racing, and says he’s eager to enjoy some fast sailing in St. Pete and good times with his fellow Windmillers. “It’s such a fun and cool group,” Huntley says. “And the Windmill is such a bad-ass skinny and fast boat. It can handle the chop easily and is really fast.” 

Five teams racing in the 20-foot Flying Dutchman class (first built in 1951) will hail from California to Tennessee and hosted by local FD ace, Lin Robson, the 2023 class winner. The doublehanded bonanza, however, will be the Melges 15 class, which will feature an impressive 31 teams, nearly double from 2023. The new one-design class has exploded in popularity across the country since its introduction three years ago, and midwinter regattas elsewhere in Florida have maxed out at nearly 100 boats.

Among the Melges 15 ranks in St. Petersburg will be New York’s Iris Vogel, who has traditionally raced the regatta with her larger one-design keelboats over the years (a Soverel 33 and a J/88, both named “Deviation”). Vogel is now enjoying the challenge of big-fleet racing and exhilarating downwind sailing.

Racing with her partner, Tim Longo, Vogel helms and Longo handles the front of the boat, and over the past year they’ve been working their way up the scoreboard, but have a long way to go to the top. “This is a totally new thing to sail in such a big fleet,” Vogel says. “J/88 events typically get a dozen boats at best, and the racing is much slower paced. The tactics are completely different and boats are fast downwind so it’s a ton of fun, but we are still learning a different style of racing. Having the smaller fleet [at the Helly Hansen Regatta] will give us a chance to work on our boatspeed.”

While the out-of-town armada is significant, local sailors look forward to the regatta every year, especially Tampa Bay’s PHRF sailors who’ve made the event a key fixture in their Suncoast Boat of the Year Series. For these fleets, which now comprise the regatta’s largest group with 38 entries across four divisions (Spinnaker, Non-Spinnaker, Racer-Cruiser and Cruising) organizers have added two days of long-course racing over the weekend. Depending on the wind strength and direction of the day, the race committee will plot a daylong course to test each team’s navigational and sailing skills, as well as their perseverance and desire to be first to the dock and first to the yacht club bar.

Local sailor Tim Landt, who has been an active sailor on the Tampa Bay waterfront for decades, is a registered competitor in the Cruising division in his new-to-him Nightwind 35, “Charisma.” He’s excited to see the regatta’s blossoming distance-race fleet and says the local growth and interest in racing older-generation yachts is good for the sport and for the Tampa Bay racing scene.

But it’s not all classic plastics in the distance fleet. In the Racer-Cruiser division will be the sparkling new Neo 43, owned by Ken Mungan of nearby Isles Yacht Club in Punta Gorda, Florida. Mungan purchased his sleek Italian-built 43-footer in 2022 with big plans to take on a few of the sport’s marque distance races, and local events like the Helly Hansen Sailing World Regatta offer he and his team an opportunity to learn the boat in a racing environment.

“When I turned 40 I needed a hobby and took up sailing,” Munger says. “I’m always trying new things and got into racing 2019. I did the Melges 24 for a while, but the Neo, because it’s a shallow-draft boat, allows me to do more local long-distance racing and we’re learning a lot.”

For this weekend’s regatta, Munger has more crew lined up than there are roles on the boat, but that’s fine with him. “We’re going to be overloaded, and I am anticipating a level of skill and organization that we don’t quite have yet,” he admits. “We’ll have two coaches and a new set of racing jibs that will be used for the first time, so it will be fun, and I’m looking forward to it.”

While the long-course racers are making their way around the bay, closer to shore, will be the multihulls: the high-tech A Class Catamarans , which have two divisions (Classic and Foiling) totaling 33 competitors, and the Weta Trimarans , with a smaller contingent from years past, return with nine boats, and among them is two-time defending champion and local Pete Merrifield looking for a three-peat.

         The iconic Lightning Class is one of the regatta’s largest one-design fleets, with 25 boats, five of which will be raced by members of the Starck family with a few world champions among them. Hall of Famer, Augie Diaz, of Miami, and Ched Proctor, of Southport, Connecticut, both world champions as well, always add to the high level of racing and camaradarie Lightning sailors enjoy all winter. The Helly Hansen Sailing World Regatta in St. Petersburg is a key warm-up event for the Lightning class’s hotly-contested two-regatta Southern Circuit with March events in St. Pete and Miami.

Sharing one racing circle immediately off the city front will be the 29-boat J/70 fleet and a reemergent J/24 fleet, both of which will no doubt provide quality racing for both professional and amateur sailors. The same will be true for the ever-competitive ORC fleet, with 11 entries, which will be racing further south. Bill and Jackie Baxter’s J/111 “Fireball,” from Stamford, Connecticut, which has won all of its events this winter will return to defend its 2023 ORC title, which it earned with ease, winning seven of eight races.

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James Grogono's 125th Anniversary Laying Up Dinner Speech

"I would have felt a fraud if I tottered up here to talk tonight without having been on the water this day.  Our bigger boats have been put away so the choice was a double scull,  a paddleboard with a comfy chair on it, or my Laser One.  I chose the paddleboard and paddled gently round the Orford Anchorage, standing up to paddle and sitting down to rest.  It was highly enjoyable. ("Who here has been afloat today?" - only Ian Robson put has hand up)

Thank You, Anthony, for asking me, and thanks to the Commodore and the Committee for all their support.  A big thank you to the AYC, to which I owe so much, for kindling my enthusiasm for sailing - which has lasted a lifetime.

It started 75 years ago.  The year was 1947.  I was 10. The war was over.  We were alive.  Dad came back from the war after three years as a medic on submarines.  The Club was 50 years old.  Very few boats were on the water compared with today, a few Redwings, National 12s, Alde15 footers, 6 Whitewings, 6 Garelochs, and half a dozen yachts.

By the way it is a BIT SCARY talking to you here tonight, and I'll tell you why.  It is not that I haven't given talks to sailing audiences.  This is my third in this Club, and it will soon be be four if you don't cancel the booking for an "Inspiring supper" in March, after today's performance. Audiences have included the Duke of Edinburgh (Who also wrote a Forward to my first book) and the Royal Institute of Naval Architects, twice, and many sailing club winter dinners.  Venues have included the Foiling Week at Lake Garda, the ski resort at Mottaret, and a freebie to Australia. These have all been a case of "Have slides, will travel", but the trouble is tonight THERE ARE NO SLIDES !  It's just "Me".  Is a BIT SCARY.

The slides were normally of  our boats flying around on foils.  This is now commonplace, but 40 years ago it was not.  Back then boats stayed in the water.  I was 30 years ahead of my time.

I am going to tackle three topics, Links with the past, Key groups of people, and Classes of boat.

Firstly, links with the past. These are personal. I did sail here before World War 2, as a passenger in my fathers National 12.  Dick Vernon was already at the helm of one.  I was aged two, probably in nappies.  My sailing life really  began in 1947, crewing my dad with my brothers racing our  Alde 15 footer.

One trophy covers a sweep of the Club's history going forward and back from that date, right up to the present time.  It is the Sheldrick Cup.  It started in 1932 as a cup race round the island for the Alde 15 footers.  It has recently been back in family hands.  I looked at the plinth, with these findings :-

Before WW2 it was won by my grandfather, two uncles, my aunt and my father.  After WW2 it was won  again by my father, by me in 1953 (at the ripe old age of 16), and by my brother Alan the following year.  The cup later transferred to the Wayfarer class,  and Alan won it three times more in the 1980s. There was then another gap until it was recently won by Simon Sydenham, sailing with his wife, my daughter Emma, and by my son Angus with Thomasin. That makes the tally 14 wins by 9 different Grogs in 85 years.

The other link takes us right back to 1897, the club was formed.  It is provided by my grandfather. He was a great friend of mine, a mad keen sportsman, and very fit when young.  He was not present at the opening of AYC, but in that year, at the age of 19, he did a cycle tour of the Isle of Wight, in one day,  riding to and from London, taking the Portsmouth Ryde ferry, a truly remarkable feat. He joined the Club in 1930 by sailing "Sonia" up from Burnham on Crouch.

My second topic is three groups of people.  The first group is the  "Grandees" of the 30s 40s and 50s, the de Quinceys, the Roneys, the Riggs,( Walter Tom and Richard), the Goodsons, the Adams, the Goodings, Lady Eddis, "B" McKinnon and Michael Crean.  As the club opened up after the War we were in awe of them, minded our "Ps and Qs", and felt we were well "below the salt". They filled the Flag Officer posts and served the club well. Less than 10 years later my grandfather was President, my dad was on the main committee, and it dawned on me that the salt had moved.

The second group of people were our friends and rivals in the Alde 15 footers. This was family racing, with one or more family  crewing each dad, and the mix of friendly family rivalry switched me on to racing for the rest of my life.

I remember the Vernons the Dobsons the Marsons the Nortons the Orange Bromheads and the Forrestier Walkers but there were many more.

The third group is those who excelled in racing in the wider world, either Olympics, or National Championships or open meetings.  First of these must be Sir Earnest Roney, who won a silver medal in the 1924 Olympics in the eight meter class.  There is a long list of the rest, Michael Crean,  Bee McKinnon ,Graham Goodson, Dick Vernon, Patrick Gifford, Simon Fulford, Peter Wilson, Graham Hinton, Ben Nichols, Peter Tracy, Rory Bowman (and Ash), Ian Robson, Richard Keane and the Sydenham brothers.  Lack of time prevents me giving more so please don't feel offended if you have been left you off.  I had an uncle and a nephew who actually sailed in the Olympics,  my uncle finishing fourth in the Star class in Kiel in 1936, finding a badly bent rudder , under the care of German "guards",after he had won two firsts and two seconds and was cruising towards a Gold, when he suddenly started going very slowly. I could do no better than finish second in the indicator trials in the Finn Class leading up to the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo.

My final topic is the Classes sailed at the AYC over the decades. The dinghy classes tended to come and go, and the keel boats to come and stay.  In the dinghy classes the 12 footer, Redwing,  15 footer, Firefly, Enterprise, Fireball, Laser2, RS 400, Mirror and Topper all came and went.  The Lapwing, Laser 1, Wayfarer, Opie and Feva came and stayed.  In the keel boats the Whitewing, Gareloch and Squib classes came and went, and the Dragon , Loch Long, Flying Fifteen and K6 came and stayed.

The Loch Long class is by far the most successful. Present in the river for over sixty years, for many years there have been more than 40 on the annual list.  They provide keen one design racing, a long season and mid week racing with expeditions to places like the Clyde and Morbihan.  I am recorded as buying "Green Ginger" (No 63) in 1988 but I passed her straight to my father.  He raced her for six years and saw the class grow from 9 to over 20.  We teased him for being too young for the class, aged 73.  He said, slightly plaintively, that he would be the oldest helmsman in the class when he started. In one race I'll never forget the Loch Longs started with the flying 15s, six of each. It was a tricky close reach along the edge of tide to Elbow. We bore away round the buoy leading from all the Loch Longs AND all the Flying 15s, two of which were helmed by Simon and Stephen Fulford.  I'm sure they don't remember.

I wish to wind this up by returning to the incredible success of the Aldeburgh Yacht Club, which gets bigger and better and better and bigger by the year.  I see us as the most successful Yacht Club in the country, and I have visited a lot of others in my travels.

My  toast is the Aldeburgh Yacht Club. Please raise your glasses.

 Thank you for your attention."

Junior and Youth

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• September 21 RYA Powerboat Level 2 Course 09:00 - 17:00
• September 21 Centenary Bowl OOD Anthony Hinton 14:00
• September 22 Youth Sailing 10:30
• September 22 Sunday Lunch 12:00

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