News
Very proud to announce that I will be hosting the RYA Dinghy Show 2020 at Alexandra Palace alongside Olympic gold medallist Sarah Ayton ⛵️🎉
Be sure to come along on the 29th February - 1st March to see the latest and greatest in the sailing world (as well as celebrate my 23rd birthday!)
What a busy few months it has been. This is officially the ‘off season’ for me given there are no major Laser championships happening, however it has been anything but quiet for me. I have taken up a few new projects, sailed an incredible number of times (including on some cool new boats) and pushed myself in new ways as I have stepped out of my comfort zone multiple times.
This is probably the longest blog I’ve ever done, but you’ll be pleased to know it’s only because of the 53 pictures I am attaching! This time I have just documented everything in my life, sailing and all, to give you a better picture about me and what I enjoy doing. Hope you enjoy.
At the start of August I did one week of work experience at one of my sponsors, Actisense, who design and manufacture marine electronics.
I got a chance to work in every department and even designed and then 3D printed my own compass and watch mount for my Laser.
Above: the compass being 3D printed.
Below: and the finished thing with watch and compass fitted. Cheers guys!
Next up on the bucket list: attending my first festival. Well, for one day only that is. Still, I had a brilliant time at Reading Festival and really enjoyed the entire line up on the Friday.
Returning home I resumed normal training, sailing the Waszp in a couple of club races at the weekends.
Or gatecrashing Radial training in Weymouth as in the picture below….
With team mate Jack Cookson officially retiring from sailing and moving to a new job in London I met up with him a day before he left and he took me for my first round of golf in Weymouth. I’ve done a bit of pitch and putt in my time but never really had a go at the full thing so it was interesting almost beating him over the 9 holes we did. As I write this he has already started his new job and seems to be settling in pretty well. Good luck mate.
Always nice to see me on the cover page of the UKLA magazine, showcasing off sponsor Actisense.
Below: A little throwback to 4 years ago on the 18th October whilst training at Hayling Island. A massive wind against tide caused some carnage as the photo below shows!
Next up for me was a rare family holiday. With our busy lives we are rarely in the same country as each other so after managing to find a week we were all in one place we decided to go on a beach holiday in Greece.
I’ve always been facinated by electronics and technology and so finding an old Zune MP3 player in my draws at home brought back some memories. Unfortunately it was broken, with a dead battery, and after some heavy scouting I managed to find a new battery which would fit inside.
Opening up, un-soldering and then re-soldering on a new battery.
Voila. Job done and she’s all working again.
At the airport with the family waiting to board the plane.
Arrived in Kalamata, Greece! Happens to also be the same place which is holding the Laser Europeans 2020 so good to get some venue knowledge whilst on holiday.
Making the most of the facilities on offer and playing tennis until dusk.
We did also sail! But unfortunately whatever boat we jumped on seemed to have quite a high chance of breakage, as demonstrated by this poor catamaran where the shrouds pulled out.
My brother Ben and I had some good battles in the Laser races all week.
Who said beach boats can’t go fast?
The physics is the same….
Holiday over and flying straight back into training.
Warm welcome from the UK, as always.
Yep this was a shock to the system!
The most sun we had all week.
Post-sailing warm down… downwind paddle boarding.
To be fair the waves were actually pretty good.
Finishing training in the Laser, I headed home and got straight into replacing my Waszp foil tips. Any Waszp sailors will know how hard this actually is!
Straight off to Southampton for a Head to Wind episode.
And then straight back home for the Olivia Inspires launch. She was a great friend of mine.
Then back to Weymouth the next day for more Laser training.
Heading off to Sunderland for the first Worlds & Europeans qualifier. A slightly disappointing weekend, finishing 5th overall.
Back down to Weymouth the next day for the latest Head to Wind, the Nacra 15 crew test - see more in the video below.
Next challenge: The Endeavour Trophy. See more about this in my blog post here
Arriving on Friday morning we witnessed the unfortunate sinking of an RS200 when the hull split in half. Ouch.
Getting into the racing on Saturday we had a great day in the light winds, even winning race 3.
Day 2 brought some much stronger winds which finally meant for a lot of hiking, something us Laser sailors are good at. We had a consistent day finishing 5th, 2th, 5th.
These results pushed us up into 4th overall and whilst we didn’t medal, we were in contention to win all the way through which is more than Ben and I had hoped for. We certainly smashed our goals coming into the event.
Collecting prizes after finishing 4th at the Endeavour.
Straight back to Weymouth the next day for another squad camp.
This time the weather wasn’t so kind…
Nice to get some rare light winds in Weymouth.
Early morning in Weymouth.
Weymouth qualifier. Freezing cold and unfortunately too many mistakes after the first windward mark! 9th.
My first real venture into writing articles! I wrote the ‘KEEP THE LEAD’ article in the October edition of Yachts & Yachting.
Been doing a bit on the bike recently. Unfortunately the weather is still not playing ball very well as shown in this picture of my sheltering under the railway bridge! Don’t be fooled by the blue sky in the distance - it was raining and hard!
Also been doing a bit of programming, using C# to develop some cool apps. My other passion.
And then this weekend just gone by I was off to Hayling Island for the 3rd Worlds & Europeans Qualifier. Saturday was called off with winds too strong and on Sunday the wind seemed too light! We managed to get one funky race in. Wasn’t particularly happy in going from 3rd to 10th over half a lap but that’s how the game goes sometimes. Final position: 10th.
Went for my most adventurous bike ride yesterday, trying to push myself all alone. Actually turned out to be a very pleasant and enjoyable 80km ride.
So that’s all for now! Hope you have enjoyed the long read and be sure to subscribe for future updates here.
Cheers,
Sam
Winning the Laser nationals over the summer qualified me for this years Endeavour Trophy, held at Royal Corinthian Yacht Club over the weekend of the 13th/14th October. This prestigious event is a collection of national champions in one event sailed in double handed RS200s. It was pretty different from my Laser and mix that with an elite field of 60 of the countries finest sailors and you have some seriously tough competition.
After some intense racing I am happy to announce that Ben and I finished 4th!
Despite being one of the heavier crews in the field we had a brilliant Saturday, even winning Race 3 in arguably the trickiest conditions of the day. We backed that up with three consistent races in windier weather on Sunday to finish 4th overall, smashing our goals and finishing just a few points off the podium and behind an Olympic silver medallist, Luke Patience.
Goals smashed for this year. Hopefully we will be back next year and on the podium!
Sam
After the Laser Nationals finished on Friday night a group of us (obviously crazy) Laser sailors drove all the way down from Scotland back to my home town for the Swanage Regatta. Despite getting less than 5 hours sleep we arrived on the Saturday morning keen to battle it out to try and win the £100 prize for winning all 5 races over the weekend.
Whilst the Saturday went pretty well for me, winning all 3 races, the Sunday proved much more challenging with a variety of fun, but uniquely tricky, courses. Whilst I did not win the £100 prize with my 2, 4 scoreline on that day, I still won the regatta. Very happy. I seriously would encourage everyone to come and attend next years regatta. It is a lovely area with some awesome sailing. there is always so much going on in the local area and even better there is a huge free BBQ on Saturday night. Check out some of these awesome photos from the weekend:
Thanks to Ben Childerly, Joe Drake and Jake Bowhay for coming down and pushing me all weekend.
Sam
The Laser Nationals this year was held in Largs, 505 miles up north in Scotland. Despite the long distance I was determined to travel up and defend my title from last year. The nationals always has a great atmosphere with some really close racing so it is a worthwhile event to put in the calendar, especially as I was back in the UK anyway.
505 miles and 13 (slow) hours later we arrived in Largs.
As per usual the Scottish weather put on a great show of wet and cold conditions when we arrived, a bit different from the near 30 degrees down back home in Swanage.
Nonetheless I unpacked and set up my new boat, 216656. Pretty cool when your favourite number is 6.
Shout out to some of my amazing sponsors, Actisense and Sailing Chandlery for continuing their amazing support over this past year.
After a day of setting up we got straight into racing, with some funky racing dominating day 1, followed by some more consistent wind in strength and direction on day 2.
Unfortunately after day 2 a theme of light winds quickly took hold and we had some loooooong sails in. Or paddles, in this case.
The penultimate day brought about some interesting thunderstorms and unfortunately no racing. However that evening we had the fantastic Gala dinner, which is always fun.
Even better, the next day I went out and after two light wind races managed to win the nationals for the second time. A great end to a good week.
That’s it for another year. And what a week it was! 2 x national champion.
Thanks to all who helped organise the event. Onto the next one.
Sam
