ILCA UK Chair Blog #97

Jul 15

Lots going on at the moment, our Nationals in August, Skills Week in Plas Heli, recent Women’s Regatta at Rutland and Masters event at WPNSA and lots more.

Let me start with the ILCA UK Open & National Championship at WPNSA. Entries close 5th August 2024 - that's less than a month! We have also held the entry fee until 31st July so the late entry will only apply from 1st August onwards. The team has published this overview of the event. What’s Included:

World Class Racing at Olympic venue
Sailor Hub with chillout zone
Mentor/Mentee Scheme
Briefing on local conditions
Welcome Pizza night (meal included in entry)
BBQ night (meal included in entry)
Après sailing snack
Sponsor technical top t-shirt
Evening entertainment every night
Race Clinics
Photo/Video coverage
Event/sponsor merch
Full event support
Daily Spot Prizes
Fantastic daily prize draws with a main prize a brand new Ovington ILCA for your club & much more!

A quick reference to the entry fee. Our aim is to provide a high-quality event (at last year’s Nationals in our survey overall 93% of respondents felt the organisation was excellent or very good versus, race management was 89% (excellent or very good) and onshore activities was also 93%) and as a result we budget to run the event at a deficit, appreciating the cost to sailors and their supporters of coming to the event. Also a very significant percentage of the entry fee goes directly to the host venue.

Finally Andrew Simpson Centre at WPNSA are offering a 10% discount to parents / siblings during the Nationals

Our first Women’s regatta was held at the weekend at Rutland and I hear it went down very well. Please see photos on our social media channels. Thanks to Fiona and her team for organising. We also held another successful Masters event with over 70 entries including 6 in the ILCA4. ILCA4 report, ILCA6 report, ILCA7 report

Finally the Olympic Regatta starts in two weeks – could you please like our post on FB in support of Hannah and Micky? Racing for ILCAs starts on 1st August. If you are one of thousands of ILCA sailors around the country that can relate directly to their competition as you sail exactly the same boat, please like the post in our FB channel.

Snippets

Get ready for the summer – Chair’s playlist of three virtual training sessions on Youtube

ILCA UK events

You can enter the ILCA UK Noble Marine Open & National Championships 2024 – WPNSA here

AGM Notice here

Welsh Championships welcome sailors of all ages on 19/21st July and Youth is invited to sail at the Youth Open event at Royal Lymington YC 27/28th July.

Other ILCA events

Over the summer there are many open meetings and Grands Prix all over the country. See our calendar.

Poole Week is popular with m any ILCA sailors – more info here and ILCA Big Monday at Parkstone Yacht Club

An opportunity to sail against other ILCA’s at Mersea Week 2024. Whilst the ILCA Nationals take place up to 17th August on 18th August to 23rd August there Mersea Week. The 50th Anniversary. Targeted at our Regional sailors in the East of England there is up to 5 days of racing, all the ILCA classes together, their own start. For entries who wish to participate for a week there is an entry. For those on a tighter budget there is the chance of taking part for three days. Further information is available at https://merseaweek.org/

RYA British Youth Sailing Team Squad Applications for 2024-25 are now OPEN - Please Click here to apply.

In addition, for those youths looking for regional racing throughout the season, check out these (none of these are UKLA events so for details please see the organisers):