This past weekend, September 19 & 20, Nassau Yacht Club hosted the Annual Bahamas Junior Sunfish National Championship.

Spencer Cartwright who is the current and 4 times National Champion in the Optimist Dinghy class has now won the Bahamas Junior Sunfish National Championship for his first time. Pushing hard and in the mix for top honors was Cochise Burrows. Such close racing made for a very suspenseful and exciting series. In the end Spencer beat Cochise by three points.

Winds throughout the weekend were light to moderate and fairly shifty from the west, which made for fun and interesting sailing. When taking the lead in any of the races it was extremely hard to keep it. Positions, particularly in the last race constantly changed. One might say it was all about luck but in reality it was very much a game of patience, “heads-up sailing” and outthinking the opponents in this twenty boat fleet.

Thirteen sailors form Harbour Island and one form Long Island participated and sailed extremely well. Paloma Cartwright from Long Island was fifth overall and received honors as the Top Female.

Sailors racing were ages 12 to 17, with an average age of 14. Almost all of them learnt to sail in the Optimist Dinghy class and have now been sailing a few years. As Coach Dunkley put it, “ It is impressive to see how well the youngsters from Harbour Island and Long Island are sailing. It is obvious their sailing schools and clubs do a tremendous job in teaching them. So while we congratulate the youngsters for their outstanding performance I would also like to congratulate the organizers and coaches in these communities – The Higgins family in Harbour Island, especially Melvin Higgins who coaches the kids a number of days each week and the Cartwright families, especially Zoe and Mellisa in Long Island, who do the same. It is always a pleasure to have them sailing here with us”.

Due to the number of competitors and not enough boats we ran with a round-robin format on the first day which determined who sailed in the Gold Fleet (top half) and Silver Fleet (bottom half) on the second day. Trophy winners were; in Gold Fleet, first place Spencer Cartwright (Nassau), second place Cochise Burrows (Nassau), third place Conner Pinder (Nassau); overall Top Female Paloma Cartwright (Long Island); Silver Fleet, first place Daisy Tinkler (Nassau), second place Madison Martinborough (Nassau) and third place Joshua Higgins/Collen Woods (Harbour Island).

Congratulations to all the sailors and a special thank you to the Nassau Yacht Club for hosting this event and again to the Bahamas National Sailing School sponsors Bahamas Hot Mix, East Nassau Rotary, KPMG, Bahamas Ferries, Royal Bank, Coca Cola, Odyssey Aviation, Cable Bahamas & Cable Cares, Kerzner Corp., Ministry of Sports, Ministry of Education and Ministry of Agriculture.