We are planning to hold the Flying Dutchman Nationals at St. Petersburg Yacht Club on November 10-12, 2023. This will be a great opportunity to test your mettle on Tampa Bay in preparation for the Flying Dutchman Worlds in late March, 2024. Additional opportunities to sail on Tampa Bay include a North American Championship to be held in conjunction with the Helly Hansen Regatta Series in February, 2024 (https://www.sailingworld.com/regatta-series/) at St. Petersburg Yacht Club (https://www.spyc.org). Lin Robson will also be organizing a series of clinics starting in the late October to November time frame to help sailors prepare for the World Championship (Contact Me) .
Author: Lin Robson
Flying Dutchman Nationals, St. Petersburg, Florida, Feb. 17-19, 2023
“Hello all FD enthusiasts, in an effort to not only have a great regatta, but an excellent marketing opportunity, the class is planning to have Nationals as part of the Helly Hansen regatta February 17-19 at St. Petersburg Yacht Club.
There should be great conditions and the usual excellent SPYC race management. Get out of the cold, take a nice FD sailing break. Let’s show off our great boat to a national level audience.
Contact me direct with logistical questions, I’ll help in any way I can. It’s important to have a good crowd of us for this one, start your plan now, there are other sailors from other classes looking at accommodation, etc., and it is high season in Florida! Contact Me
2014 North Americans Announced
The 2014 North Americans will be held April 25-27, at the St. Petersburg Sailing Center in downtown St.Petersburg, FL. Many know that three FD Worlds have been held at this site, 1962, 1997 and 2006.
Meet the President
For those who have not heard, after a long and successful tenure as President of the U.S. class, Tim Sayles has handed the reins to Buzz Ballenger of Santa Cruz, CA. Buzz is known worldwide as an expert sparbuilder, boat builder and competitor in dinghies and keel boats.
2013 U.S. Nationals
The 2013 U.S. Nationals will be held November 1-3 at the Gulfport Yach Club, Gulfport, FL. We’re expecting some great fall sailing, and social events.
2013 Midwinters
By Lin Robson
For many years we have held the FD Midwinters at SPYC in downtown St. Petersburg. Due to some scheduling and other reasons we moved the regatta site this year, to a place I had not sailed out of since a teenager.
HPDO / North Americans
Every year over Columbus Day weekend in October, the American Yacht Club in Rye, NY, hosts the HPDO. HPDO is the acronym for High Performance Dinghy Open. It is a regatta that has become a big fixture in the Fall on the East Coast, with many dinghy classes in attendance. In fact several classes held their North American championships at the regatta this year. They throw a nice dinner and gathering afterward. We had the pleasure of seeing a few FD sailors from years past, it was good catching up with Guido Bertocci and others.
CORK
Hurricane Irene had several effects on the regatta held in Kingston, Ontario this past weekend.
After racing Friday night, NED 308, the team of Willem and Maarten, had to return to Connecticut to prepare for the storm. Their home is in Darien,CT, right in the expected track area .
We did have two good days of racing, with beautiful, but on the light side breeze conditions. Saturday morning all of the weather data was pointing to a rainy and very breezy day Sunday, so the decision was made to break down and not sail the last day of the weekend. All the data I saw the next day indicated that was a good call, winds with gusts in the thirties.
Worlds review
 Lin & Richard heading upwind |
After all the stories and images before coming to Garda, I’d have to say in this case the anticipation could and did not exceed the reality. As all those attending know, we sailed in one of the World’s most beautiful places.
Racing could be a very one sided affair tactically, although in some races the unapparent side held advantage. I was struck by the emergence of more teams sailing at very high levels, with no one equipment approach holding dominate. In the end it was the best prepared packages and tactical decisions on a difficult race track that carried the day.
One note about the starts, I would like to see going forward a tougher stance by race commitees on using and enforcing the black flag. There were too many premature starters that went undetected. Enforced black flag starts keep starts legal and save time in the end.
Richard and I did not achieve our goals, but the process was challenging and we did have some results we were happy with considering the limited time we had to sail together. Now it’s back to the gym and refocus on Santa Cruz.
Great scenery, people and racing during a work week, that’s a really fine way to go!
More later as bandwidth gets better,
Lin
 Long start line with 3 rows |
 Reaching toward leeward mark |
 Crowded rounding for the leaders |
 Pavel having a good day |
 Nigel & Jonathan at the Cafe |
 Lin & John Best talking it through |
Photos courtesy of Caroline Kramer
Full Circle
With all that is going on in everyone’s life these days it’s sometimes hard to keep sailing schedules aligned and on track.
Fifteen years ago, much of the U.S. fleet was preparing for our National Championship in Canandaigua, NY. During a warm up at the race site for the regatta, the person I was planning on sailing with encountered a health problem that kept them from continuing in the regatta.
Fortunately at that time Richard Phillips, well known to everyone in the class, was touring the U.S. and had stopped by the regatta site for a look. He was quickly recruited to sail. We had a good series, won that year by Mike Loeb and Guido Bertocci, with some of the top positions decided in a dramatic last race.
Now, again very fortunately for me, Richard has agreed to sail with me at Worlds coming up soon. Seems that sometimes good things can come around again!
Looking forward to seeing and sailing with friends from around the world very soon now.
Best,
Lin