The Tribune

THE Fidelity Bahamas Optimist National Championship Regatta concluded Sunday in George Town, Exuma.

Forty eight sailors competed from islands throughout The Bahamas, including sailors from the Grand Bahama Sailing Club, The Hope Town Junior Sailing Club, the Harbour Island Sailing Club, the Eleuthera Sailing Academy, the Mack Knowles Junior Sailing Club, the Bahamas National Sailing School, and the host club - The Exuma Sailing Club.

Five junior sailors also joined from the Southern Yacht Club in Louisiana, USA.

The conditions were near perfect for the weekend of sailing in iconic Elizabeth Harbour with sunny skies and 10 knot breezes blowing consistently from the south east. 

The race committee of both green and championship fleets were able to complete all seven races with minimal issues or delays.

The green fleet was dominated by the Hope Town Junior Sailing crew with Flethcher Johnston clean sweeping the regatta and winning all seven races. 

He was followed in second by fellow Hope Town female sailor Valentina Pinder with 18 points. Rounding out the green fleet was newcomer Grayson Kemp from the Harbour Island Sailing Club with 19 points. 

Pinder had the second place position all but locked up after the first day of sailing with a 12 to 19 point gap over Kemp, but Kemp stormed back with three strong races on Sunday to close the gap to just one point, jumping from 5th to 3rd place overall.

In the championship fleet, the competition was tight between the top Bahamian sailors and the visiting team from the United States. Twenty eight sailors made up the Championship Fleet which consisted of a white fleet (10-11 year olds), Blue Fleet (12-13 year olds), and Red Fleet (14 & 15 year olds). At the end of the first day it was Eleuthera Sailing Academy veteran Finley McKinney-Lambert at the top against the entire fleet, holding off Southern Yacht Club sailors Sullivan Reznik, Connor Blouin, and Elizabeth Lovell. McKinney-Lambert won 2 out of 4 races on day one and the Americans Reznik and Lovell won the other 2. As the wind speed fluctuated on Sunday from steady and breezy to light and shifty, Conner Blouin and the Americans charged hard and took advantage of their smaller size to gain on the veteran and older Bahamian sailors. Finley had help from local Exuma Sailing Club sailor Emit Knowles sailing in his 6th and final Opti Nationals. The veteran Exumian used his home harbour advantage to help put pressure on the Americans with McKinney-Lambert. In their likely final race in the Opti class in The Bahamas, McKinney-Lambert and Knowles finished first and second in race 7 to close out the regatta and hold off the American team.

When the waves settled on Sunday afternoon it was Finley McKinney-Lambert standing alone at the top with 8 points to win his first Opti National Championship and the Geoffrey Holowesko Floating Trophy which is awarded to the top Bahamian Sailor every year. Second overall was Conner Blouin of the Southern Yacht Club, third overall was Sullivan Reznik also of the Southern Yacht Club from Louisiana. The younger sailors of the Championship, the Fleet White was lead by Everett Blouin from the Southern Yacht Club, second was Christian Wells from The Bahamas National Sailing School in Nassau, and third was Kaiden Burrows from the Exuma Sailing Club. The Blue fleet, 12 and 13 years olds, was dominated by the American team, lead by Conner Blouin of the Southern Yacht Club, second was Sullivan Reznik from the Southern Yacht Club, and third was Elizabeth Lovell also of the Southern Yacht Club. The veterans of the fleet, the Red Fleet, was lead by Finley McKinney-Lambert of the Eleuthera Sailing Academy in first, Emit Knowles of the Exuma Sailing Club in Second, and Callum Pritchard of the Bahamas National Sailing School in third.

Dallas Knowles, chair of the event and coach of The Exuma Sailing Club was happy with the overall success of the weekend: “We want to thank Fidelity bank and JS Johnson for the tremendous support once again towards this event as well as Bahamas Ferries for helping us get all of the boats from all of the other clubs here to Exuma. We couldn’t have asked for better weather this weekend! It’s not often you are able to get all 7 races in with time to spare, so hats off to both the race committees and sailors for doing a good job being efficient from start to finish. While the Optimist fleet in The Bahamas is going through a bit of a rebuild right now, we are still confident that the young crop of Bahamian sailors coming up in Optis will keep building on what has been already established here in The Bahamas. This event remains the flagship event in opti sailing in this country and we look forward to meeting again at another club next year!”