The Tribune

GREGORY Lindsey dominated the Sunfish fleet in the Bahamas Youth Olympic Regatta earlier this month.

The event, hosted every year by the Bahamas National Sailing School with the support of Bahamas Olympic Committee, was held at Nassau Yacht Club "in fairly light and shifty wind conditions on the Saturday and steady, near perfect conditions on the Sunday," according to a press release.

Lindsey won six out of the seven races in the series. Gabriel Newbold finished second and Vano Rahming third - all of whom are participants in the TA Thompson/HO Nash Junior High sailing programme. "Gregory has been a top sailor and lead person in this programme for over three years and now assists Bahamas National Sailing School as an instructor with its year-round programme.

"This regatta is one of the four major junior international class events (Optimist Dinghies, Sunfish and Lasers) held each year in The Bahamas, which usually attracts some 40 to 50 sailors from a number of Family Islands as well as Turks and Caicos. Unfortunately this year, due to school exams, many couldn't make it so numbers were down to 29," said the release.

In Optimist Green Fleet (our most junior sailors) Richardo Frode took top honours, with Henri Mott and David Zlicha placing second and third respectively. "These kids who are just eight to 10-years-old are sailing amazingly well for having just started less than a year ago. The Advanced Optimist fleet saw close racing between the top five sailors, all of whom are on Bahamas National Sailing School's international race team."

Joshua Weech (Nassau) in the end won overall, beating out the defending champion Isaac Fox (Long Island). Isaac was second and Morgan Grammatico (top female) was third.

"In the Laser Radial class, three of Nassau's top junior sailors - Paul de Souza, Cochise Burrows and Spencer Cartwright - battled it out as they have done now for over five years. Paul dominated the first day until Spencer found his groove and started to take control, but a bit too late. In the end Paul beat Spencer by one point to take fleet honours. Spencer was second and Cochise was third.

"I am so pleased to see how well our government school sailors are performing these days in the Sunfish. Through coach Johnson's efforts over the last two and-a-half years in bringing these students to sailing we are now seeing impressive results," said Robert Dunkley.

"The students from TA Thompson and HO Nash as well as Centreville Primary (thanks to Ms Moss) attend sailing classes during school hours once per week. In addition, CV Bethel attended classes after school (thanks to Ms Carey and Mr Rolle). This is what our programme is all about - getting our youth in the greater community into sailing.

"Congratulations to all the sailors and a special thank you to Bahamas Olympic Committee for sponsoring this event, to Nassau Yacht Club for allowing us (BNSS) to use their facility and to all the parents who volunteered their time to make this event so successful.

• Summer Sailing Camp starts on July 11. To sign up now (for beginners and experienced sailors), just call 357-3959.