Announcements, News

Summer Update from the Commodore

Greetings PRSA Sailors!  As we head towards the fall sailing season I wanted to take a moment to share the latest news from PRSA and update you on our fall plans.

  • Membership: with 114 members this year we are at our highest membership level since 2005!  This is great news, and we are only partway through the year.  On top of this, we’ve added a number of new boat owners in the Buccaneer, Laser, and Lighting classes.
  • Upcoming Racing:
    • Back by popular demand we plan to  hold another PRSA Distance Race on the river on Sunday, August 21 if there is sufficient interest (we need at least 5 boats).  Please let Aaron know if you’d be interested in sailing in this event.  We will use the same NOR, SIs and Course Diagrams that were used on June 12.
    • The PRSA President’s Cup will be held on September 17-18.  The NOR has been posted.  Register now to receive the early registration discount and make sure to invite your friends from other clubs!  We will once again have the American Spirit as a spectator boat on Saturday as well.  Finally, check out this great piece of PRSA history: the regatta booklet from the 1955 President’s Cup Regatta (thanks to Bobby Astrove for digging this up for us!).
    • The PRSA Fall Series kicks off on September 11.  Your PRSA Executive Committee will be providing food and beverages for after the racing, so come ready to race and then bring your appetites to the post-race BBQ!
  • Regatta News: PRSA sailors have had a lot of success at regattas near and far this summer.  Congratulations all around!
    • Barney Harris and Mike Chaballa took 1st place at the Albacore Nationals and PRSA Sailors took places 1-4 in the regatta.
    • Kyra Tallon and Will Phillippe took 1st in the Buccaneer class at the VA Governor’s Cup.
    • Barney Harris and Matthew Rhodes took 1st in the Albacore class at the VA Gov Cup, winning the VA Governor’s Cup (congrats to the Albacores for having the largest fleet at the regatta!)
    • Lisa-Marie Lane, Christy Dillard, and Karen Grefe-Jones represented PRSA and Lightning Fleet 50 at the Lightning Women’s North American Championships.
    • John Van Voorhis, sailing with his daughter Rachel and  Lee Ann Zaretsky, will be representing PRSA and Lightning Fleet 50 at the Lightning North American Championships.
    • At the Buccaneer North American Championships Jeff Neurauter and Heather Howard took 3rd place, Kat Martin was the highest placing female skipper, and Connor Burke was the highest finishing youth skipper.  Great job!
    • Len Gunther took 2nd place at the Deep Creek Laser Regatta.
    • PRSA/Lightning Fleet 50 Sailors Aaron Boesenecker, Bob Gotthardt, and Guy Barkwell will be sailing as part of Team USA in the 1st Annual Old Dominion Boat Club International Regatta.  They will be competing against teams representing Australia, Canada, Great Britain in S2 7.9s right off the Alexandria waterfront.  Come on out and cheer them on!
  • Sustainability: if you haven’t already seen our sustainability page, take a look!  Thanks to the efforts of Kyra and Laura we have had our major regattas and regatta series certified by the Sailors for the Sea Program as clean regattas.  This is good news for the environment and good news for us as PRSA becomes a known name in the sustainability community.
  • Media Mentions: perhaps you saw the article on PRSA Sunday Sailing (along with a great photo from our 2016 Rookie Regatta) in the August 2016 edition of SpinSheet?  If not, check it out!  The September edition of SpinSheet will feature a note on the PRSA President’s Cup Regatta along with photos from Lindsay Bach.  In addition, WETA sailor Ben Arthur was featured in the May/June 2016 edition of Sailing World in an article entitled “An Outer Banks Experience (p. 54-58).  The article includes a photo of Ben on p. 58!
Announcements, News

2016 President’s Cup: September 17-18!

President's Cup Logo

The 2016 PRSA President’s Cup Regatta will be held September 17 & 18 at Washington Sailing Marina, continuing the long tradition of competitive one-design racing started by the President’s Cup in 1934.  The regatta will be sailed on the Potomac River on two courses.  Visit the regatta website to view the NOR and register for the 2016 President’s Cup!  Registration fees increase after September 11, so make sure to register and pay online before September 11 to save yourself a bit of cash.  We will once again offer a spectator cruise aboard the historic schooner American Spirit on Saturday, so be sure to tell your friends and family!

Thanks to our regatta sponsor, Annapolis Performance Sailing, and to DC Sail for the partnership that allows us to offer a spectator cruise aboard the American Spirit!

APS-Logo-OrangenoText DC Sail

Announcements

Want to go sailing?

Getting involved with PRSA is easy!  Just click the “About Us” link on the upper right menu bar to learn about our activities, sign up for our email list, see our schedule of events and more!  Over the summer we hold a very informal sailing series off of the docks at Washington Sailing Marina (near the launch cranes), starting at about 5:30 pm on Wednesday evenings.  Please feel free to drop by and introduce yourself!

Announcements, News, Results

Fantastic Fun at the PRSA Rookie Regatta!

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We had a great turnout for the 2016 Rookie Regatta, with 15 boats on the water and new sailors or crew in new positions on almost all of them!  The wind was a bit tricky, but we still managed to run 4 races.  There was plenty of time left afterward to enjoy a beautiful sunny afternoon on shore with some BBQ & beer as we all chatted about the racing and celebrated the rookies!  Thanks to all who volunteered and — especially — to all the rookies who came out to give things a try.  We hope to see you out on the water again soon!

Congratulations to the following teams for winning their respective classes in the 2016 PRSA Rookie Regatta:

  • Albacores: Michael Heinsdorf & “Rookie Pam” (who drove at least 2 of the 4 races!)
  • Buccaneers: Jeff Neurauter & “Rookie Adam”
  • I-20s: Molly Houston (Rookie Skipper!!) sailing with Rick Loheed
  • Lightnings: Brint (Rookie Skipper!!), Kendra (Rookie Crew!!), and Will, providing tutelage to two rookies on his boat and guiding them to a win in the class with two bullets in four races!

Continue reading Fantastic Fun at the PRSA Rookie Regatta! →

Announcements, News

PRSA Rookie Regatta: Rescheduled for June 26!

We have rescheduled the PRSA Rookie Regatta for June 26 after our first attempt earlier this spring was foiled by inclement weather. This is a special stand-alone one day regatta with the purpose of encouraging you all to bring new crew out to sail, to turn the helm over to your crew, or to do other creative things that might help involve new people in sailing.  The scoring system will be a bit different for this one day as there will be bonuses involved for bringing new people.  All of the relevant information, including the NOR and the Sailing Instructions, has been posted to the PRSA Rookie Regatta page: http://potomacriversailing.org/nors-sis/prsa-rookie-regatta/  Please note that in accordance with our PRSA Sustainability initiative we will not be providing hard copies of the SIs on Sunday.

Aaron will be PRO for the day. It would be helpful if you could you let us know whether you will be sailing on June 26 and, importantly, whether you are bringing more than a few “rookies” for the day.  We can accommodate extra folks on the RC boats to switch in and out of various boats if we know how many people to expect.  So please email Aaron (apb99@mac.com) once you’ve thought about your lineup for the Rookie Regatta.  Let’s get some new sailors on the water!

Announcements, SI's & NOR's

PRSA Distance Race: June 12

On June 12 we have a special event: the resurrection of the PRSA Distance Race!  This one-day, one-race regatta will pit all boats in all classes against one another in a distance race around government marks on the Potomac.  Portsmouth Yard Stick scoring will be used to determine the fastest PRSA boat on the course.  The NOR iand SIs with course options are posted below.  Organize your crew and get ready for the fun!

PRSA Distance Race NOR

PRSA Distance Race SIs and Course Diagrams

2016, Announcements, News, Results, Spring Series

2016 Spring Series #8 Wrap-Up

A handful of Lightnings and one hearty Buccaneer came out Sunday for what turned out to be a beautiful day of sailing.  The forecast was for high winds and possible thunderstorms, but despite a few gusts early in the and some grey clouds it ended up being a wonderful day on the water.  PRO Kyra Tallon and her crew got us 4 beautiful races in a steady southerly breeze.  The wind filled in over the course of the day such that the gusts diminished and the overall velocity became more consistent in the 12-15 range.  There were a few shifts on the day, notably a big lefty in race 3 that ran counter to the overall advantage one gained by sailing right (west) to find breeze and some shifts.  It was a great day to work on boat balance, trim, and downwind angles in a bit of breeze (but not too much).  Fun was had by all and we were back to the dock by 2:30 thanks to a high tide that allowed us to sail just outside the airport pier (though I did dig my centerboard into the mud a few times later in the day).  Overall it was a great way to round out the Spring Series racing!

Related Links:

2016, Announcements, News, Results

PRSA Spring Regatta Results

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What a fantastic weekend!  The weather cooperated, and our excellent race committees (headed by Rolf on the upper course and Stephanie on the lower course) did a fantastic job of getting us a lot of great racing.  The lower course boats completed 7 races on Saturday and the upper course boats completed 8 races over two days.  We had 47 boats and nearly 100 sailors competing overall, which is a fantastic turnout!

Final results have been posted to the Regatta Website and you can see some great photos from Day 2 taken by Lindsay Bach here.  I also want to extent a huge thank you to Heather, Melissa, and Lisa-Marie for all of the time and effort that they spent organizing food and beverages (the BBQ was amazing and the drink selection was phenomenal!) and for managing our PRSA merchandise.  A lot of folks now have fantastic PRSA bling to sport on the water!  Overall I’m very thankful to all of the dozens of people who volunteered to help make this such a fantastic regatta.

Announcements, News, Results

2016 Spring Series #7: March Weather in May

On the one hand it is crazy that we had cold rain and temps in the 50s today.  On the other hand, it is also crazy that this might have been one of the best days we have had all spring!  The weather certainly has been crazy, and once again a group of intrepid sailors made the best of it for a day of river racing.  We had 5 Lightnings, 5 or 6 Albacores, 3 I-20s, a Buc, and a couple of Lasers out on the race course.  PRO Bob Gotthardt and his RC crew did a good job to get us 4 races in a shifty, spotty NE breeze.

I was especially pleased to have my parents out on the race course despite the dreary weather.  My Dad sailed with me on #14592 and my Mom took some great photos from the RC boat!  Scores are posted below, and you can keep reading for some details from my vantage point on Lightning #14592.

Continue reading 2016 Spring Series #7: March Weather in May →