Liz Baylis

Liz has been awarded the Linda Elias Sailing Scholarship from the Long Beach Yacht Club Sailing Foundation.

According to the Deed of Gift, the purpose of the Linda Elias Sailing Scholarship is “to present grants to individuals who have advanced the sport of sailing by their own accomplishments or by assisting others. This is what Linda Elias represented in doing so much for others. The grants may be presented to students, other foundations, men or women, persons that have fared well with their own accomplishments, have assisted someone else to advance their abilities or have enabled others to experience the sport of sailing.”

Winning is only half of it. Having fun is the other half.

-Bum Phillips

While visiting family in Seattle, we visited the Seattle Art Museum Olympic Sculpture Park (http://www.seattleartmuseum.org/). It is a wonderful park filled with sculptures and archetypal lansdscapes of the Northwest. There are many sculptures including works from Louis Bourgeois, Alexander Calder, and Richard Serra. The landscapes range from the shore to valley with a lush assortment of native species.

If you’re in Seattle on a clear day, like we experienced today, a trip to the OSP is well worth it.

The Long Beach Yacht Club Sailing Foundation hosted a very successful Match Racing 101 Clinic on the weekend of March 17-18. Four teams of seven sailors per team participated in an action packed and educational weekend sailing the Foundation’s Catalina 37s. Over the two days of the clinic there were six hours of classroom work and ten hours of on-the-water training, culminating with a formal Regatta. The classroom work was led by Liz Baylis, 2002 Women’s Match Racing World Champion and Rolex Yachtswoman of the Year from San Francisco. The Long Beach Yacht Club hosted the clinic and ran the on the water portion with their usual efficiency and precision.

In the classroom setting, Liz presented all aspects of match racing from the basic concepts of the match racing starting sequence to more esoteric boat on boat situations that arise in a match race. On the water, the participants went through about a dozen starts and experienced a plethora of situations. This type of on the water training is the only way to really learn how to match race. No matter how much you read and study, there is nothing like going out and doing hands on training.

The LBYCSF has an incredible asset that they are willing to share – the availability of a fleet of equally matched boats for teams to practice match racing is invaluable.

With the momentum and enthusiasm from this weekend, the LBYCSF has more events planned in the near future.

Come out and give match racing a try. It’s fun and will make you a better sailor!

E.T.’s plans changed abruptly, so no trip to Mexico this spring. We’re setting our sights on the Coastal Cup in June and some cruising between Santa Barbara and the Channel Islands around Fourth of July.