lawrence squad

4 Notts County youngsters in national squads

An amazing achievment as four of our young sailors & windsurfers make into into the National squads, of three different classes. Congratulkations to all four, a few shots pieces below.

RYA Topper National Junior Squad Selection - Lawrence Logan

Great and exciting news came through the email system from the RYA last week; after 3 years of Topper Zone squad training and a great year around the Topper racing circuit Lawrence, who learnt all his sailing at NCSC from aged 8, has been selected for the Topper National Squad. The 25 strong squad is the pinnacle of the Topper sailing community and sailors are selected from the whole of the UK.

Recognising that the Nationals and Inland events now draw entries of around 375 boats, start lines with over a hundered boats, and sailors aged from 12 to 16 (with the occasional, overwhelmed adult!) this is a great achievment for him, still only 13. A hard winter's training - primarily at the Weymouth Sailing Academy (Olympics 2012 venue), Hayling Island, Pwllheli and Rutland (thanks goodness - a local one!) beckons before competing again around the 2011 circuit.

Lawrence is mainly looking forward to having the 'RYA National Squad' badge to sew onto the back of his bouyancy aid - apparantly guarantees front of the grid starts - and looks forward, of course, to competing as much as possible in the club - slow fleet that is.

and two weeks later....

Emily Hall has got into the windsurfing National squad. As you know we have seen little of her this year (except on Wednesdays) as she has been going round the circuit, along with the odd freestyle event. We think she may be the youngest person to have got on the squad, so an excellant achievement (I think she is still 12 - for a short while).

Cameron Coghill has just rung to say he has got into the windsurfing National squad, great news, and well done Cameron. More info to follow.

Andrew makes Optimist National Squad

This year one of Andrew’s main targets was to be selected for the Optimist National Squad. National Squad status is granted to the top 30 ranked sailors in the country after the three ranking events, The Inland Championships, The National Championships and The End of Seasons. This year’s National Championships saw just under 500 sailors at the Olympic venue of Weymouth including competitors from Japan, USA, France, Germany, New Zealand and Spain.

The campaign did not get of to the best of starts with a 43rd at the Inland Championships however a 10th GBR sailor in the Senior Fleet at the Nationals and a 19th at the End of Seasons more than made up for it and gave an overall ranking of 20th.

At the Nationals Andrew was awarded the Tim Spaulding Trophy for being the first competitor outside the GBR Worlds and European teams.

Other achievements this year have included being selected for the GBR teams for Braassemermeer (Holland) and Flanders Youth Regatta (Belgium). He has also won the Midland Area Championships, Speed Midland Travellers Series and for the third year running the RYA North Zone Championship.