We had 15 sailors in ideal conditions on Saturday, 8 - 10 knots from the South West. The attendance of Nathaniel Deverell, who is part of the Worlds Team, was not enough to knock Airi of the top spot, which shows how far he has come in a very short period of time. Jono Barnett made an appearance for the first time this season, whilst his brother was over on the Starling course getting his first taste of a fast boat. Good to see the brand new Opti 4476 out on the course and it's new jockey Brianna enjoying the new speed. Matt won Sailor of the Day for very consistent results, including 2 seconds and 2 thirds.

13 sailors took to the water last weekend in light and shifty conditions. Our first race had a wind direction coming out of the northern end of the beach, pretty much West. Out in the channel, the keel boats coming out of the harbour were flying spinnakers with an Easterly... This meant that the support boat (Minori and Peter) had a busy day re-setting marks. All good though, and we got 5 races in. Airi top scorer and soon to move up to Starling with all the weight he has put on eating free pie on a Saturday (joke...). Well done to Louis winning his first race, and was Sailor of the Day.

Hi all I've just got back from the OSAF Single Handed Youth Regatta in Aitutaka, Cook Islands. Eliza and Henry Wilkinson had been up there for a week or so running coaching sessions for the local sailors before we arrived. My lack of sailing since the Nationals showed. The Aitutaki Sailors have been sailing 3 times a week over the 'winter'.
We arrived at the venue located on Motu Akaiami where the Teal Flying Boats use to land to refuel in the 1950's. My very near new XPS Opti was waiting there already to go except for my sail that we had brought with us. The Cook Islands Sailing Clubs have just taken delivery of 22 new XPS Optimists.

Eliza sailed an Opti for the first 2 1/2 days of the regatta and won all the races that she started.
I made a reasonable start with 2 thirds on day 1 followed by 3rd,OCS,4th on day 2. Both days with around 10 - 15 knots of breeze.
Scores after 2 days with 1 drop:
Eliza Wilkinson 4
Jono Weston 13
Eric George 13
Duane George 14
Titi Kaukaura 14
So all really close excluding Elisa.
The third day was hard with 21-25 knots of breeze we only did 2 races. I finished them in third and fourth.
Day 4 The wind dropped a little bit bringing a fresh breeze of 18-22 knots. I started the day well with a 1st followed by two fifths (my worst results of the Regatta). Going in to the last day I was in second place only by one point:
Duane George 30
Jono Weston 31
Dean Tetuaiteroi 32
The first race today would entitle us to a second drop and unfortunately both Duane and Dean had a worse result to drop than me.

I finished the first race strongly with a second to Titi (Duane 3rd, Dean 6th) followed by another 2nd in the last race (this time to Duane).
I finished the regatta second overall which wasn't bad since I've only been to the lake a few times for training.
Overall it was a great regatta sailed inside the beautiful Aitutaki Lagoon the colour of the water was amazing.

Check out this link for Information on Aitutaki and Akaiami.

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Travel-g309706-c12618/Aitutaki:Cook-Islands:The.Coral.Route.html

I have some photos at :

http://www.cleverpig.org/JonathonWeston/?page=gallery&gallery_id=366

Congratulations to Leonard Takahash-Fry in winning the UK Nationals in Pwllheli, Wales last week. Congratulations also to Markus Somerville representing Wakatere, who was placed 3rd. Isaac McHardie was placed 5th.

All three of these sailors are representing New Zealand at the Optimist Worlds starting in Napier in December 2011.

The full results can be found at http://www.kbsuk.com/data/OptimistIOCAEvents/data/results/2011natsengoldnh.html

The event website is an interesting one. The event is run using qualifying days and final rounds, and a variety of fleets http://www.kbsuk.com/optimist/iocaevents/index.asp?EventID=32