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Youth and Collegiate Sailing Focus by Franny Kupersmith
O
ne of my favorite regattas of college sailing is the annual memories of the previous year’s racing and competition, with spring Team Race Intersectional at St. Mary’s College of one of my favorite moments being an uncharacteristic downwind Maryland (SMC). Over the past five years, I have sailed topple in next to no wind conditions by one of college sailing’s Allin the event three times and assisted with the event twice, once as American superstars… an undergrad and once as a graduate and freelance photographer Although the racing and the competition have been the main looking to enhance my portfolio. focal point of the regatta for me, this year, watching the event The event is always scheduled for the first weekend of SMC’s through my Nikon lens atop my perch in SMC coach Adam Werspring break and marks the beginning of a week of intense training blow’s inflatable forced me to look at the racing in a whole new before the highly anticipated Truxton Umstead Regatta held each way. My view took me back to my freshman year experience, as year at the U.S. Naval Academy (USNA). While the coed teams not only did the conditions prove to be at times similarly chilly and gear up for the SMC regatta first and then the Trux, the women’s blustery, but the perspective allowed me to reconsider the moments teams plan for the opposite, sailing first at USNA and then comof intensity and excitement that I had witnessed firsthand from peting the second weekend at SMC. For the finish boat. This year, as photogme, the event marks the beginning of rapher, I tried to focus on the specific getting down to business for the spring moments that can be captured during racing season. At this point in the season, racing. there are just four short weeks before the In sailing, especially when it comes mid-Atlantic sailing teams compete at to team racing, great scenes usually the Prosser Trophy for one of three covstem from the race-changing plays eted spots at the Intercollegiate Sailing that make or break the regatta. What Association (ICSA) National ChampionI’ve found with photography is that ships, happening this year in Austin, TX. the art in image-making comes in Traditionally, the SMC Team Race capturing the moment—not just any has been known for its beautiful balmy moment, but the moment, the one weather and the Trux for its high winds that embodies the entirety of the and notable “drysuit weather” conditions. scene. Although I am still learning In recent years, it looks like the weather the technique and the fundamentals ##University of Rhode Island sailors compete at SMC. has gone a bit haywire, and that, in the of sport photography, I’ve found that Photo by Franny Kupersmith words of Forrest Gump, “You never understanding racing is a helpful skill know what your gunna get.” While each year, my high school when looking for that fleeting instance of intensity, concentration, friends and roommates were off vacationing in the distant lands of and adrenaline that can be captured in a single image. beachside villas and palm trees, I experienced a new kind of spring While driving down to St. Mary’s County Saturday morning break, SMC style. before the racing, I went over the fundamentals of racing and the As a naïve freshman, the whole experience of spring break moments of intensity that I remember feeling as a college sailor in training and the frenzy of the intersectional team racing event were an attempt to map out the moments I wanted to capture. I knew new to me. Watching the event live from the finish boat alongthat the simplest images and the best shots could come from folside fellow teammate, Teddy Hale, was exciting. I could sense the lowing one or two boats around the race course and capturing the adrenaline and intensity as the sailors crossed the line. Although I interaction between the two. Also, thankfully in sailing, and espewas almost on the verge of frostbite in the cold, wet, and blustery cially in breezy, chilly, early spring conditions, there are many opconditions, I knew that I wanted in—I wanted a slice of that inten- portunities for high intensity moments. Hopefully this weekend, as sity. I wanted to be at that level, racing in those trying elements. I head back down to my college stomping grounds for the second Little did I know that the next year, I would be racing in the event weekend in a row to shoot the St. Mary’s Women’s Intersectional, and again would be out in the rain sharing a boat with Señor Hale. Mother Nature will pull through and provide some breezy spring For three years, I raced in the event, each year bringing back the conditions for some incredible photograph opportunities. Follow us!
SpinSheet April 2012 85