Living Large at FBYC's Junior Week
on Monday June 26, 2006 11:39PM
We must be living right. For nearly all of Junior Week we had beautiful warm weather including a full range of wind conditions on Fishing Bay from a 15-knot souwester to a full fish frying drifter at midweek. Sure the nettles made a prematurely prolific appearance along with fiesty hords of noseeums in the evening on a night or two, but by and large we were living very large. The kids tried on their sailing shoes with the help of some of the best coaches you'll find anywhere and I can't believe they didn't make some new friends. Best of all, they added to their enjoyment of the sport of sailing with memories that should last them a lifetime. Truth be known, I'd bet the parents had some fun hangin out at the clubhouse with their colleagues and a sundowner in the evening. Don't let on but just because its called Junior Week, this IS supposed to be fun for the parents as well.No fewer than 90 juniors paticipated in this year's event in addition to the 20 beginners that preceeded them for Opti Kids on the two prior weekends. Added to that was the 73-boat fleet of juniors that materialized for the Virginia State Junior Championship on Saturday in spite of a 70 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms. If that was'nt enough, 20 stalwart survivors of the regatta returned on Sunday to participate in our Junior Team Racing Clinic led by our excellent racing coaches Diego Ravecca and Alejandro Cloos. For the clinic, Diego, Alejandro and our juniors were joined by their colleague and friend Juan Carlos Romero, our 2005 coach that is now head Optimist coach at Annapolis Yacht Club. It was great to have Juan back to join us for some great fun and coaching on the water and we hope this is the beginning of a fruitful collborative relationship with our friends at AYC.
We hope this is only the beginning of a long sailing summer for many of our Juniors who we hope will return this season to spend more time on the water and in front of the chalk board with Alejandro and Diego for racing or with Daniel Gillispie, our new Learn2Sail coach. We've lined up a great season of learning and racing that we think kids and parents alike are sure to enjoy. Please visit us on the web to see how much you and your kids can extend their fun this summer at www.fbyc.net !