Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all. I hope that 2017 has been enjoyable for everyone, and that everyone is excited for what the New Year has in store for us!
This season for the juniors has ran great, with numerous juniors achieving Stages 2, 3 & 4 in the RYA Youth Sailing Scheme. We also had a few new sailors from the sailing course ran this year and last year, as well as a couple of the juniors venturing into the adult racing!
I believe that there are around 50 junior club members, which we would love to reach out to, regardless of their ability to sail and their age. Therefore, for this New Year, we are hoping to get more of the juniors in the club involved in sailing, as there are many who don’t attend them, but do go out at other times. We are also hoping to encourage the juniors to start racing with the adults as well as taking part in the junior sessions.
There is a sailing committee meeting on the 3rd of January, where we will be discussing how to improve the juniors for the New Year. I am looking for suggestions, from anyone of any age, any ability, to either help with the aims above for the juniors, or could be any suggestion that you think you help improve the juniors. A couple of suggestions are below:
1. In order to integrate the juniors into Sunday racing is by using the clubs RS Visions with a more experienced sailor, either helming or crewing the boat, depending on the confidence and ability of the junior sailor.
2. to separate the junior race from the junior sessions, as the ‘racing’ aspect is sometimes off-putting for new sailors, by having the junior race on the Sunday at the same time (and course) as the adult race but starting 5 minutes before or after the adults. We may also change the date of the junior sessions to a Friday instead of the Saturday, to attempt to get the Friday junior sailors involved more.
Please let me know if you have any suggestions for the juniors, and if anyone would like to volunteer with helping with the junior sessions or with one of the suggestions above Please reply with any suggestions by the 3rd of January. I would like to make 2018 a successful year and I can’t do this without your support.
Thank you very much, and a happy new year!
Jill Reid
Junior Representative
Attenborough Sailing Club