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The winter seminar season wrapped up with 24 up-and-coming race officers attending the race management course held at Opua Cruising Club last weekend.
Photo: Sailing Energy / World Sailing
This year's seminars revolved around a theme of creating predictable and consistent race management for our sailors. A total of 63 people from more than 23 yacht clubs attended seminars in Auckland, Wellington and the Bay of Islands. This has resulted in nine newly-qualified club race officers and four national race officer revalidations.
Northland’s seminar was a highlight, as there is a current shortage of qualified race officers in the region. It was pleasing to see strong representation from multiple clubs, enabling club members to debate the future direction of race management at their clubs and fostering good connections across the region. There was a wide range of abilities and experience, with some with virtually no experience at all and others who specialised in only keeler fleets, providing an opportunity for knowledge and experience to be shared.
The race management seminars cover a range of topics over the two days, from race organisation and course laying to starting and finishing procedures, as well as working through real-life scenarios. A focus has been made on familiarity with the rules of part 3 of the racing rules of sailing.
We have been impressed, as always, with the enthusiasm, commitment and dedication of our volunteers, and thank them for their time and effort to allow racing to occur throughout the country.
