Young kiwi Laser Radial sailor, Andrew McKenzie placed second at the CORK Olympic Classes Regatta in Canada, hot off the back of a win in the youth regatta which preceded it.
“Arriving with one day to acclimatize on the back of 30 hours of travel was not easy however, my Rotary host family made me feel very welcome and at ease,” reports Andrew.
“The light and shifty conditions of the CORK International regatta made for a challenging start. My pre regatta winter training on Auckland harbour, in equally light and choppy conditions, proved to be the perfect preparation and resulted in me winning the Laser Radial youth event with five wins from ten races in the 150 competitor strong fleet.”
The second regatta was the CORK OCR, an open event. “The competition for this regatta was of a much higher standard and included the top Canadian women Olympic trialists. Conditions were better with predominantly 12-16 knots for the three days that racing was able to take place although the other two days were lost due to extreme weather. Consistency was the key. Eight out of ten finishes in the top six was enough to secure 2nd overall. I am extremely happy with how I sailed and have learnt many new things on big fleet racing and boat speed.”
McKenzie, from Auckland’s Kohimarama Yacht Club, was in Canada for the CORK Regattas after being selected as the 2011 recipient of the Yachting New Zealand St John’s Rotary Scholarship.
“It was an awesome couple of weeks racing for the young guy who has two more years left as a youth and will now come home to start getting ready for the coming year’s youth selection trials aiming to make the NZL Yachting Trust Youth Team to go to Dublin, Ireland in July 2012,” says YNZ’s Youth Head Coach Ian Neely.
“Arriving with one day to acclimatize on the back of 30 hours of travel was not easy however, my Rotary host family made me feel very welcome and at ease,” reports Andrew.
“The light and shifty conditions of the CORK International regatta made for a challenging start. My pre regatta winter training on Auckland harbour, in equally light and choppy conditions, proved to be the perfect preparation and resulted in me winning the Laser Radial youth event with five wins from ten races in the 150 competitor strong fleet.”
The second regatta was the CORK OCR, an open event. “The competition for this regatta was of a much higher standard and included the top Canadian women Olympic trialists. Conditions were better with predominantly 12-16 knots for the three days that racing was able to take place although the other two days were lost due to extreme weather. Consistency was the key. Eight out of ten finishes in the top six was enough to secure 2nd overall. I am extremely happy with how I sailed and have learnt many new things on big fleet racing and boat speed.”
McKenzie, from Auckland’s Kohimarama Yacht Club, was in Canada for the CORK Regattas after being selected as the 2011 recipient of the Yachting New Zealand St John’s Rotary Scholarship.
“It was an awesome couple of weeks racing for the young guy who has two more years left as a youth and will now come home to start getting ready for the coming year’s youth selection trials aiming to make the NZL Yachting Trust Youth Team to go to Dublin, Ireland in July 2012,” says YNZ’s Youth Head Coach Ian Neely.
From: Briefings, 8 September 2011 Yachting New Zealand newsletter
