Amateur Sailor of the Year

Originally posted by turnturtle For those who genuinely do worry about their mid fleet result being affected by some pros, ringers and parachute squaddies at the front, let me enlighten you.... Coming 50th with 10 of them ahead of you carries a lot more credibility than 40th in a noddy class. I ultimately share Jim and Dan’s view- I think it’s great that I can hand on heart say I’ve raced against the best of my generation, and the best of many more in adult classes. As a side note The fact that women are punching hard in the top of the more prestigious fleets is welcome news; gender was never a factor down my end of the results anyway- that was ultimately one of the appealing factors of dinghy sailing as a kid, it wasn’t dominated by the football team pricks who couldn’t deal with a girl being better than them at something.

So which "Noddy" classes get turnouts upwards of 40 boats?

Originally posted by Daniel Holman A word about amateurs. The Olympians and wannabe Olympians are not professionals per se. They are Corinthians funded by the lottery system to train and race “full time”, and will “earn” far less than grads of the same age of which the vast majority will go on travel and equipment. “Taxable” income per se will be negligible. Unless Daddy is rich of course. They got to be in this position through demonstrating talent, ability, determination, and proving it regularly in international competition. That is different from getting £900 a day sailing a racing yacht professionally. Any of the Olympic or even wannabe guys/ girls may have coaches and be fit etc but would cuff mere national champions even if they had been on the sofa for 2 years. Sailing is a skills and experience game - anyone can get fit. Similarly, vast majority of sailors would only get incrementally better with 200 days in a year of coached training and racing, even if they didn’t burn out. “Trainability” is apparently a very sought after quality in any sportsperson.

This. So much this

Yep, Barbados was a good effort and obviously anyone who can beat Nick Craig is damn good - but it was still an overwhelmingly British/Irish fleet, like the class itself. Yes, the UK is one of the world's top sailing nations without a doubt, but the point is that the GP14 class is still not a global class in the sense of Lasers, RSXs, Fireballs, 505s, OKs, Snipes and many others and therefore its worlds can be seen in a different light.

Last 24 hours of voting for this.... 

Can't say I've ever heard mention of her, but great that a woman gets it and on merit, not that it's unheard of that Cathy Foster was handy back in the day I recall.