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NEYYSA Team Racing 20/21st September - What a Weekend!

Published 14:59 on 24 Sep 2025

Over the weekend of 20th/21st September two Ripon SC teams took part in the NEYYSA North Region youth & junior team racing championship. The event was sailed in RS Fevas with two boats in each team.

ROTTERS 1 (the Red team) had two experienced youth helms (Christopher H and Oscar T) with three junior crews (Wesley, Ray and Henry) as sailors under 11 are allowed to share a team place. ROTTERS 2 (the Blue team) was made up of junior sailors with Archie T and Callum P as helms and Curtis A and Eliza L as crews and turned out to be the youngest overall team in the whole event.

Over 160 races were scheduled for Saturday although in the end only around 120 races were completed, almost all in pouring rain with occasionally just drizzle for a change. The results from these races were used to split the teams into Gold, Silver and Bronze fleets with ROTTERS 1 making it into the Gold fleet with only 2 losses and ROTTERS 2 in the Bronze fleet.

Sunday's racing was much, much harder for ROTTERS 1 as they were now coming up against teams who regularly sail and team race together, and who could anticipate each others tactical moves. Several races went right down to the wire, and there was at least one where it looked like a Ripon win right until the last second. With only two wins ROTTERS 1 finished 6^th in their group but with plenty of positives to take away, particularly for Oscar T in his first experience of team racing.

Meanwhile ROTTERS 2 were finding life a bit easier in the Bronze fleet. After pulling off a stunning victory in their final race on Saturday tactics were starting to click and it was great to see the young sailors growing in confidence as their boat handling and tactical awareness improved. Despite struggling a little with the starts their boat speed was good and in particular they seemed very strong on the final beat, often able to hold an opposing boat out beyond the finish line to turn a losing position into a winning one. After 9 tough races ROTTERS 2 finished with 6 wins, giving them third place overall in their fleet.

It's been fantastic to watch the development of our ROTTERS over the season and their efforts at this event really deserve to be celebrated. The weather on Saturday was somewhere between grim and miserable most of the time but they kept each other going through it all. Our Red team helms provided excellent support and feedback both to their own crews and also to the Blue team sailors and all 9 ROTTERS came away from the weekend with plenty of positives and full of plans for more new things they can try. We should all be very proud of their efforts.

We should also give a huge thank you to all those involved in running this event, whether from RSC or other clubs. It couldn't happen without all of you, whether it was NEYYSA event organisation, race management, shore teams, umpiring, safety boats and bar staff. Also a massive thank you to York University for doing the catering for the weekend, not only did they provide an excellent menu and service, but they also raised money towards their new fleet of Fireflies, which are sailed at the club.