Jim's Sailors Making Waves in 2008

Geoffrey (age 12) and Stephen (14) Nelson teamed up to travel north to the Butterfly Junior National Championship on beautiful Torch Lake MI with their custom Texas-flagged boat, and thoroughly surprised and dominated the 64-boat fleet, scoring 3 aces and a deuce after the throwout to win what has been a highly competitve event in recent years. One of Jim's Colorado sailors, Mike Ruwitch, finished 9th in the Open Championship.

Stephan, also sailing 420s, was the youngest helmsman at the Bemis (US Youth Double-handed Championship) finals. And Geoffrey won the very-competitive Central States Sailing Association's overall season championship in Optis, with little brother Zachery (age 10) finishing 4th overall.

 

Left are some of the 5 420s that turned out for a weekend of what one of the sailors described as 'really intense' drills, on Lake Winnebago at Neenah, WI in late July. This was Jim's third 420 group this year, and the second session on Winnebago. In June, he had a quick visit to one of his long-term projects, the growing 420 fleet at Oshkosh, for a check-up on race skills, along with a similar check-up on the Oshkosh X-boat fleet.

 

Left is Geoffrey Nelson again, one of Jim's Opti kids who has risen to higher levels. The photo is from the Opti North American Championship in Curacao over the 4th of July week, where Geoffrey was one of the youngest and lightest in the big wind, big waves and 200+ boat fleet. Over Easter, he sailed in the Easter Opti Regatta in the Netherlands. He qualified for both in spite of his age (11 at the time of the events) at earlier Opti team selection events in Florida and at Annapolis.

 

On the right is Team Saflex training on Lake Champlain in VT, where the Malletts Bay Boat Club hosted 2 weeks of steady work. Left to right, Connor Aswad of Burlington VT, Will Schwarz of Harvard MA, and skipper Ian Schillebeeckx of St Louis. The training ended with the team winning the District Junior Championship at Marblehead MA, prior to traveling to Montreal for the Lightning World Youth Championship, where they finished an outstanding 2nd. They then finished 3rd in the North American Junior Championship, and got lots of compliments for their Gold Fleet performance in the Open North Americans.

 

Left is an E scow for a private weekend of work on the new asymetric spinnaker on Grand Lake in Colorado - in May!!

Below left are a bunch of Carlyle Sailing Club Laser sailors learning new ways to get around when there is no wind. Three of the the sailors then teamed up to be the first-ever Sears Cup finalists from Carlyle, finishing a very respectable 6th. And on the right, an I20 working on the best angles for asymetric spinnakers on Lake Carlyle IL, along with other I20s and Es. In the center, Jim starting with the basics for a group of Butterfly sailors new to racing on beautiful Lake DuBay in central Wisconsin.