Winter Newsletter

A request from your Commodore:

Reserve the dates 26th & 27th June 2010 - for the Commodores Weekend.
Each year we have a 'Commodore' and this year I am the one to receive this great honour. Each summer the Commodore organises a whole week-end of fun and activities on and off the water at Yeadon Tarn. The weekend starts late Saturday morning and goes on throughout the day with fun races and games on the water.

In the early evening on Saturday there will be a huge BBQ event with a "PIRATE" theme. Everyone will be encouraged to bring along a Pirate fancy dress, and we will have face painting, etc. in the Clubhouse. The highlight will be the launching of YSC‘s very own ‗Pirate Galleon Ship‘ which will be crewed entirely of juniors!
All we need is an old wooden boat to convert into a Galleon so if you have one, or know of one, please let me know.

If you want to get involved in building the Galleon throughout May and June please let me know – the more people helping the merrier.

I want to encourage as many people as possible to enjoy the Commodores Weekend so please feel free to bring along friends and family to join in the fun. More details about the weekend will be posted on the YSC website in the Spring
Gerard Kennedy, Commodore

Events At a glance

Working parties 6th/13th March, 11th Sept 10am—5pm all day breakfast supplied by Gerard!

Open Day 8th May 10am — 4pm
Commodore‘s Weekend 26th and 27th June
Autumn BBQ 11th September
AGM 25th November
Laying-up Supper TBA possibly 3rd or 4th December
Training Sessions
Pre-season Familiarisation 21st March 1pm—5pm
Adult Race Training Day 17th April 11am — 5pm
Tuesday Night Sessions 20th April to 10th August 7pm—9pm
Saturday Junior Training 8th/15th/22nd May, 12th/19th June,
11th Sept 12pm - 2pm
Junior Race Series 15th May, 19th June, 4th and 10th July,
5th and 11th Sept
New Members Introduction 12th June (food 11.30am ) 12pm - 2pm
Junior Team Racing Event 9th October
Ribbed N12 Racing Events 23rd May, 18th July, August 15th and 10th Oct

These will happen on the 6th and 13th of March starting at 10.00

OnBoard update

There has been a further delay in the application for OnBoard status for the club, and it may take some time to resolve some of the difficulties that have arisen. In the meantime we are intending to bring forwards the ap-plication for the Volvo Championship Club scheme which would give the club access to funding, training and coaching support.

In addition to this the RYA are promoting a scheme called ‗More Adults Sailing More Often’ which is aimed at encouraging more participation from both new and existing adult members and Yeadon will also be able to access funding and coaching support via this route.

Members' news

Last Year when the cold weather prevented them from sailing in the UK, Mike and Barbara Pickard set off for Antartica. Whilst visiting a South Geor-gia seal colony they spotted a week old seal pup barking for food it scarcely had his eyes open

Junior News from Benjamin and Matthew:

In September we were informed that we had successfully made it into the Mirror Dinghy National Junior Squad! Since then we have been training in the Squad at Weymouth, Rutland and Hayling Island.

We are really looking forward to going to Slygo in Ireland for the European Championships in August.

Our goal is to come in the top 10 boats as we came 3rd in the Inlands and we are the current Scottish Champions!!!!!

Well done boys we are very proud of you!

New Members Introduction Session

Sat 12th June - 12pm until 2pm (Bacon sandwiches available from 11.30am).

A new idea for this year, is to have a practical, but informal session be-fore the Saturday racing begins, to show new members who have joined us in the last year how we do things at the Club. We will run through the basics such as where things are kept and the essentials such as not bolting the top bolt on the fire door when we are in the clubhouse.

Followed by the fun things such as the social events and what we are planning to do on Commodore's weekend!

All members are required to do at least one Race Officer duty a year or for the less experienced one Race Officer‘s Assistant duty. The Race Officer and the Assistant run the afternoon‘s racing session. This is an excellent way to find out more about racing at the club. Duties average out to one duty per sailing season for each series you sail in. We will show you where the equipment and information you will need is kept.

The last part of the Introduction session if the weather conditions are suitable will be spent leaning about the safety boats, the fuel they use etc. and how to handle them on the water.

Dutyman

We have now started to use dutyman to organise OOD duties. (If this is news to you and you are a full or family member of the club then it probably means that we haven't been able to contact you via email or phone. Please send an email to sailingsec@eldwick.org.uk so you can be added to the system!)

Duties are allocated on the basis of volunteering in the first instance and subsequently by me filling in gaps. If you do quite a bit of racing you should probably volunteer for 4 (four) OOD duties over the year. If you don't race much (or at all) please at least volunteer for 1 (one) AOOD duty. If you are a parent of a keen youngster; volunteer on the basis that they come along and get involved. If you fall between these extremes, help the club in other ways (training, cooking) or have other constraints on what you can do then make an appropriate compromise.
Use common sense when volunteering for duties on days marked as Open meetings, Junior races or Special Trophy races such as Non-winners or Ladies.

The sooner you allocate your duties the more choice you will get but if the date you want has gone you can always ask to swap.

There is a link to the dutyman system under the Results menu option on the club website. Or type http://www.dutyman.biz/dmmain.aspx?id=Y0001631 into your address bar and enter the user name and password you will have been sent by email. When you log in to the site you should click on the 'Roster' tab to see the duty dates. Volunteering, Swapping and Confirming are done via the tabs down the right hand side.

Information Appeal

In a moment of rashness on New Year‘s Day I offered to re-do the club display board which contains historical information articles and photo-graphs that had become badly damaged by damp. I then recalled being asked by Terry Kelly when he was Commodore (sorry Terry I know that was 4 years ago) if Sarah and I could help and add some history information to the Trophies that the club has, some of which go back before the war.

Sarah and I have been members, initially as kids, (extremely young ones!) from the 1950‘s and our parents were also keen members, so we do have many memories and a fair bit of information, press cuttings and old photographs passed on by parents etc. This self inflicted task has now grown and we are hoping to put together a DVD or CD with this in-formation so that it can be stored for future reference by our Secretary. Copies can also be made available to fellow members who may have the same anorak type interests in this stuff as we do. Can you help?

We already have some of our older and past members searching through photo albums for information however if you have any photo-graphs or press cuttings that can be scanned and added in we would very much appreciate hearing from you. Photographs of special events or even old photographs of the surrounding areas before the mills were pulled down may also be of interest. All will be returned in good order after scanning and if you think you have something of interest please do get in touch via my details available on www.dutyman.biz

A few samples of things already on file are shown on the next page. On the DVD we will include our Golden Jubilee Booklet (1978), press cuttings including a race report from 1931, sketches drawn by John Scott in the 1950‘s and photographs of the original Yeadon Flatties that Uncle Willie used to make for £5 a boat (excluding mast and sails) and an electronic copy of our 75th Anniversary Booklet.

Don‘t be shy if you have something which may be of interest do please get in touch.
See you on the water, I promise to do more sailing at Yeadon this year in addition to sailing our National 12s all around the country.

Howard Chadwick N2, N2266, N2769 and N3356 Squidgy Bits

Training

Could this be the year for you to learn some new skills???
People associate "training" with new people learning to sail, however all of us, young and old, beginners and experts, can benefit from some training to improve our time on the water and at the Club; from improving your sailing skills, to confidently handling the safety boat and being able to pass your knowledge on to others. The 2010 training programme has something for everybody enabling us all to learn something new.

Pre Season Safety Boat Use Reminder and Dinghy Fettle Sunday 21st March 1pm till 5pm This is a chance to get out on the water, check everything works, to stretch those muscles and try and remember how to sail and drive the safety boats before the normal racing programme starts the following weekend.

Adults Race Training Day – Saturday 17th April, 11am till 5pm This is a chance to improve your sailing and racing skills with a planned training session on the Tarn. Please let Neil know if there are any areas you would like the session to concentrate on. More details will be published on the Website / Club Notice Boards closer to the day.

A copy of the RYA Coaching Handbook and DVD is available for members to borrow. For Lasers, Toppers and double handed boats they detail in simple steps: boat set up, how to carry out the main manoeuvres of tacking, gybing, mark rounding and the very important techniques of stopping and accelerating again! To borrow the handbook or DVD or both contact: Neil McInnes, Hon Sailing Coach National 12 3216 contact details on dutyman

Saturday Lunchtime Junior Sailing and Race Training Sessions
12pm until 2pm To give the juniors who have picked up the basics and can sail a simple course an opportunity to step up from what they do on a Tuesday‘s evening. We run some training sessions on Saturday lunchtimes to improve their sailing and introduce them to racing.
Dates:
8th, 15th and 22nd May
12th and 19th June
11th September

Tuesday Night Training – Starts Tuesday 20th April and runs through 17 sessions until 10th August, sessions starting at 7pm This is our mainstay of training throughout the Season. This is primarily aimed at newcomers to sailing and those who want to improve their sailing, but it is also good for experienced sailors as helping out makes you more confident and makes you think about your own sailing. Tuesday Nights are always well supported within the Club but we always need volunteers to ease the load on the existing helpers so do come along. This includes helping on the shore, driving one of the safety boats, giving assistance out on the water to the participants and even to help lead the sessions.

Junior Inter–Club Team Racing Day – Saturday 9th October This was a great success last year with 21 Juniors from 4 local Clubs taking part and all having a whale of a time. The Tarn looked splendid full of Picos, so we plan to do it again!

For Junior Race Dates see the Events Calendar on the back page.
What ever you do, enjoy your sailing See you on the water!

National 12 Sunday Morning Ribby Sailing 2010!

23rd May, 18th July, 15th August and 10th October

Any members out there with a ribbed National 12 are very welcome to come along and join in with the races. For everyone else come along and see these beautiful old boats close up and watch them sailing. Then talk to the owners, helms and crews when they are ashore. It's a pleasant way to spend a Sunday morning if the weather's fine as many of us already know. The racing usually starts from around 10.30am through to 2pm. It is all dependent on the weather - if it's too windy then we won't be sailing as the old girls are quite fragile.

Details of some of the boats participating are listed below: Listed under: Sail Number, Name, Year built, Age, then Design N2 Goldcrest 1936 74yrs Barnt Green One Design N261 Roamer 1937 73yrs Uffa King N341 Mat 1938 72yrs Uffa King N493 Laughter 1945 65yrs Holt 500 N711 Sinner 1949 61yrs Gnome N1183 Tessa 1953 57yrs Proctor Mk 2 Their average age is 67 years old (some of the participating helms are slightly older!) Tim