2024 National Championship
Thanks to the Osoyoos Sailing Club for hosting this event. Their volunteers provided basic breakfasts, lunches and a potluck supper on Saturday evening. They ran the races, placed the marks and were on standby if needed on the race course.
The clubhouse was made available for the out of town participants which was a big help. A total of nine participants raced in predominantly light winds and with twelve races over the three days it made for a fair bit of time on the water.
Patience and getting to the windier parts of the lake helped to propel our boats around the course. Three LOSC members, relatively new to racing SeaSprays, took part and hopefully will continue to compete with this boat at their club.
Congratulations to Don Snell placing first, newcomer to SeaSpray racing Kevin Langley 2nd place and Mike Sonnie 3rd place. This is Don's eleventh National title which ties him with the legendary Dave West for most titles — how does 'legendary Don Snell' sound to you Don?
A nice diversion from waiting for wind was the kayak races. After each race, out of breath competitors returned to the club, I was hopeful that we wouldn’t need a defibrillator. Tony Slovak from the Osoyoos sailing club won the men’s kayak race tournament and his wife Nadia won the ladies kayak race tournament.
A few LOSC members and especially Stan Storwick have been very instrumental in redeveloping older Seasprays into top competition boats. A steady encouragement of individuals sailing the boat can be traced back to this club. Stan mentioned to me, that the club chose the SeaSpray many years ago as a good choice to develop into a fleet as it had many advantages over other boat types.
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| The reason for the kayak racing... |
