Documents from the 2022 NLZA AGM held on zoom 7pm 25 October 2022.

 

Waikato – Bay of Plenty Regional Update for ILCA.nz for AGM 25 March 2022

 

Last season we scrambled through Covid lockdowns & traffic lights, awaiting a fresh season, esp in Waikato.

 

Winter ILCA sailing happened in Tauranga (fortnightly) providing a regional gathering point for ILCA6 racing. Sailors came from Ohope, Taupo, Rotorua, Ngaroto, and Hamilton.

Keeping everyone to a single ILCA6 fleet kept numbers around 8-12 and competition strong.  Over & above the individual scoring, we informally ran a masters v youth competition (recording the best 3 places). This made for some good spirited competition, humour, and the odd patch of match racing.   At Queen’s Birthday a strong regional contingent attended Ohope’s annual regatta which is a major boost for their regatta.

 

In July, Tauranga’s Teagan Denney attended the youth worlds as the female youth rep.  Tom Saunders, also Tauranga, continues to hold his top position on the World ILCA stage.   Both are outstanding role models & inspiration for our youth.  Ex World Champ Nik Burfoot is now coordinating coaching in Tauranga; thereby making it an attractive drawcard for up & coming youth in ILCAs; rather than having them graduate from starlings & spread across several fleets.

 

As the summer season gets underway, ILCA club racing has vibrant fleets in key places. Tauranga now draws a strong fleet of 10-12 ILCA6s each Sunday. They continue to encourage everyone to remain in ILCA6s so that it is a tight competitive single fleet. Several youth are now entering/eyeing AON squad over the next couple of seasons.  And the masters continue to push them for excellence. 

 

Taupo continues to hold a combination of ILCA6s & 7s, with several members investing in newer boats.   In mid-March 2023 Taupo’s regatta will also be used as an ILCA North Island Freshwater Champs, hoping to attract sailors from across the NIs. This may offer a NI wide regatta for end of season.

 

Hamilton continues to hold its core of strong masters, very skilled at picking wind shifts on a lake. George Lane continues to win open ILCA6 events, keeping HYC on the NZ radar.  They are rebuilding the starling fleet and getting outcrop regattas.that will likely move into ILCAs next season.  

 

At Ngaroto and Raglan a core of club ILCA7s meet for club racing, but not much travelling beyond.  Two families in these contexts are now travelling their ILCA6 youth beyond to Auckland and Tauranga in order to connect with other youth, and increase their competitiveness.  The dads are also racing ILCA6s outside their clubs, and will likely take these experiences back to their local clubs.  They are now committing to NIs in Napier and look forward to the free entry for Nationals as a helpful incentive.

 

As a combined region, we considered setting up a 5 regatta ILCA Traveller Series this summer; but instead have focussed on encouraging attendance at two key regional regattas; Tauranga (late Feb) and Taupo (mid March); with Ohope offering a pleasant Queens Birthday winter option.

 

Recently across the region ILCAs made a commitment to support the Rotorua Sprints regatta in mid-October.  Tauranga fleet committed to forego club racing points being counted, in order to encourage attendance at Rotorua.  We look forward to Rotorua getting its ILCA sailors to hopefully Tauranga & or Taupo regattas as a reciprocation.

 

We’ve talked of a coaching weekend, but with busy schedules, regattas booked, and Tauranga already offering strong youth coaching, we haven’t found a date to book.

 

Female ILCA6 sailors continue to feature as strong competitors amidst these ILCA6 fleets; and are attentive to encouraging one another. Having singular ILCA6 fleets benefits youth & women. Where clubs mix ILCA6s & 7s, we recommend having prizes for both fleets; but also consider having separate starts.  Good ILCA6s are unfairly buried by average ILCA7s off the start line; which becomes a disincentive for racing an ILCA6; and risks them changing to a different boat.

 

Overall, regional networking over several seasons is paying dividends with ILCA vibrancy in a number of clubs.  We strongly encourage reciprocation if clubs want others to attend their home regattas.  Having a core of masters in ILCA6s provides fleet stability as youth age in and depart out of the fleet.  Creating good spirited competition, with humour and encouragement for the youth, also adds attraction & retention in the fleet.

 

Thanks again to ILCA.nz for offering support to the region. We look forward to being a strong presence at NIs & Nationals.

 

Helen Spencer

Waikato-BoP Rep

 

Reflections from Waikato & BoP regions.

 

Regional Congratulations:

Sam Meech finally put his name (TYPBC) on the National trophy in Jan 2021.

We’re also proud of him representing NZ at Olympics; which was a notoriously difficult event to prepare for.

 

Peter Thomas (TYPBC) took out 3rd Masters Radial against some pretty challenging winds & competitors.   Tauranga Harbour doesn’t quite have the waves of Worser Bay; but we do know he snuck out the Harbour entrance once to do some training.  Hopefully Queen Charlotte Sound is more like inner harbour waters?

 

George Lane (HYC) took out 3rd in the Open Radials.  After years away, we knew he was secretly making a comeback, trying to train on Hamilton Lake.  Not really waves training for Worser Bay; so a pretty impressive result.

 

Teagan Denny (TYPBC) held 3rd Youth Woman position. Teagan has benefitted from the AON training; and we appreciate her modelling pathways for our younger female sailors.

 

Congratulations also to the core faithful ILCA sailors that travel to regattas outside of our region, reminding others that we have a strong ILCA core here. They bring back such experiences to our club organisations, etc.

 

Around our Region Clubs

Networking between Clubs is something we’ve tried to develop. 

Queens Bday at Ohope  we tried to commit to getting to one another’s key regattas in some way. Unfortunately Covid has already knocked out Rotorua Sprints, and likely to impact other regattas.  Thanks to Pete Thomas for keeping up the email comms amidst our key regional ILCA folks.

We’d like to draw on some outside coaching, but Covid uncertainty has made that difficult to plan anything.

 

TYPBC:

Tauranga is enjoying a resurgence of ILCAs (referred to as Ironing Boards by the Zephyr old boys).

Over summer & winter the fleet grew to regularly 7-8 radials each Sunday; and 12 on the race list.

2 more youth have purchased ILCAs this spring, and we’re coaxing in the odd adult that happens to launch an old laser for a social sail.

We encourage the adults to sail radials to keep us together with youth as a single fleet.  Yes, even Kent Copplestone can be seen in a radial.

Over winter racing, informally there became jovial competition of masters v youth for top 3 placings each race.  We masters drew on our wisdom & experience to stay ahead of those young fit up & comings.

 

HYC

Hamilton continues to hold a strong core of masters sailors (that also hold the club flag officer roles, etc). They still travel to key regattas, including the odd event in Auckland.  QCYC bookings have already been done for this group.  At the club we’re nurturing a new group of youth that have done LTS and are moving into starlings & old lasers. We’re hoping to expand them out to some regional regatta events.  Who knows in Covid times though?

 

LTYC

Taupo has seen a regrowth in radial sailors, having purchased some second-hand ILCAs. Thanks to Mike Pasco (NZsailing) for buying in trade-ins & getting them back out to our clubs market.  LTYC have been building a good relationship with junior sailing families in Napier; but I wasn’t able to tap into any Napier ILCA sailors through them.

 

POYC

Ohope hosted their regular QB regatta enjoying faithful support from around our region.

 

RSC

Rotorua has a couple of ILCA sailors, that we’re trying to keep links with.

 

Raglan Sailing Club

Although Raglan is not formally YNZ affiliated, we continue to dialogue with key people there. Charlie Watts is a local, also a membership at HYC, that attended Nats in New Plymouth. We hope to get him back to Nats at QCYC.  A few of their youth are now moving into ILCAs, and we hope to encourage our regional youth interacting with one another.

 

Cambridge Yacht Club

Cambridge continues to be led by Chris Raynes, an ILCA sailor.  He got 3 ILCAs over to TYPBC’s regatta in March.

 

Lake Ngaroto Yacht Club

A few hardy locals still pull out their old lasers sometimes.  Some HYCers try to attend some of their events, but the converse aren’t travelling much now.  WTYA Youth program is a strong focus there.

 

Waikato Thames Yachting Association regatta is scheduled for Ngaroto end of Nov (Same weekend as NIs in Napier unfortunately, but Covid may eliminate the clash?)  It’s an opportunity to keep the networking alive in the Waikato region so we’re working collaboratively.  Covid may eliminate the clash anyway.

 

Looking Ahead to the Upcoming Season

Waikato is now in L3, and not allowed out sailing. Its taking a toll on not getting our LTS programs up and running.

At least in Auckland L3 step 1, some training is happening. We may need some way to advocate for a Step 1 in Waikato?

So far BoP has dodged the Covid bullet and are underway with summer racing. 

 

Women in ILCAs in our Region

As above, Teagan Denney (TYPBC) has benefitted from AON Training and we hope this will have a flow on effect for younger females up & coming.

LTYC has a couple of females amidst their ILCA fleet. 

HYC has a core of ILCA sailors. We note there is a near 50% female participation across various club roles & levels of our sailing.

HYC was hoping to host a Women on Water series this term using our Quests.  It could have potential to offer individual coaching done in club lasers for any women interested.   Covid has other ideas!

 

Thanks again for the collegial support of Pete Thomas, as we share enthusiasm in the region.

Thanks to Nick P, Jenny A, and others that share enthusiasm for nurturing ILCA sailing at grassroots Club levels.  We look forward to what Jenny may bring to her new role working with women in sailing, esp ILCAs.

 

Helen Spencer

 

Commercial problems with the Laser trademarks mean that the Laser classes are being renamed.
With the new logo shown above.

New Name	Previous Name
ILCA 7	Laser Standard
ILCA 6	Laser Radial
ILCA 4	Laser 4.7
ILCA 7 Masters	Laser Standard Masters
ILCA 6 Masters	Laser Radial Masters

This year is the 50th anniversary of the Laser class. Over that time the class has become synonymous with single handed dinghy sailing worldwide, from mucking around off the beach to the absolute peak of competition, the Olympics, and pretty much everything in between. While the hull and the basic design of the boat has remained unchanged for 50 years the class has progressively introduced new rigs; the Radial and 4.7, and developed an extremely strong worldwide Masters division to widen its appeal. It now has a worldwide following of sailors from under 12 to over 80 years of age. About 220,000 Lasers have been built and it is a measure of the success of the design that most of these are still sailing.

 

In spite of all this success there have been many changes to the commercial background of the class over the years, with a litany of manufacturer changes, trademark ownership changes etc, but through all that turbulence the fundamental brilliance of the boat has seen its success continue and its status as the preeminent dinghy class in the world grow.

 

Unfortunately, one side effect of the latest commercial ruckus is that there has been what has proven to be an unresolvable dispute between the owner of the Laser trademarks in most of the world, excluding Oceania, and the international class and World Sailing. This now requires the class to change its sail logo and rig identifications as listed above. While this problem does not apply directly to New Zealand (or Australia) we have made the decision to move with the rest of the world and change to the new logo and naming conventions.

There is absolutely no need to change any existing class legal equipment but all class legal sails and equipment sold from now on and all future official class correspondence will use the new logo and conventions. You may have already seen the new ILCA logo appearing on sails and from now on will see that and the new rig naming convention on boats and at regattas around the country. Its only a name and logo change, there is no change to the boats. The new naming conventions use the new class name and approximate sail area of each rig.

 

Its still the boat we all know and love, it will just have a different symbol on the sail and a different names in the headlines. So don't worry, its still the largest adult dinghy class in the world, its still the mens and womens single handed Olympic boat and the World Youth single handed boat for both boys and girls. It will still have the most World Championships of any class with the largest number of sailors and you will still see lots of them at pretty much every regatta in New Zealand. 

 

It's just got some new names.

Nick Page