CYC Youth Sailed Through Summer; on Chestermere Lake and Beyond Jen Peddlesden, CYC Historian
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n Thursday evenings in May through October, you will see sailors of all ages from the Calgary Yacht Club (CYC) racing sailboats on Chestermere Lake. These sailboats include single-handed (one sailor) dinghies: ILCA/Laser & Optimist, and the double-handed (two sailors) C420 dinghy and 29er skiff. But the Albertan and Canadian sailing worlds are wide and both youth and adult CYC sailors venture out to test their skill at Provincial and Canadian championships. Youth teams train and practise evenings and weekends in several boat types and some athletes commit to a busy schedule of travel and competition. In May 2023, the CYC Youth Team travelled to Victoria to compete in the Spring Dinghies Regatta where CYC sailor Zairyn Mierau placed third in ILCA 4 (Laser 4.7). Calgary Yacht Club was then delighted to host speaker Jim Turner who presented about AC40 Team Canada’s upcoming participation in the prestigious America’s Cup, an international sailing regatta dating back to 1851. Jim is a highly accomplished sailor with over 20 years of America’s Cup experience. He is also an Olympian and 15-time world champion. Under his leadership, AC40 Team Canada aim to win the inaugural Women’s America’s Cup in October 2024 6
November13, 2023 Volume 23 No. 46
in Barcelona, Spain. Canada will also send a Youth Team to the respective Youth event. New to America’s Cup, all Youth and Women’s teams will compete race the innovative onedesign AC40, a four person, 40-foot (12.2 metres) foiling monohull with an impressive anticipated top speed of 44 knots downwind. Calgary Yacht Club has experience with America’s Cup as CYC’s own ILCA sailor Peter Wilson, and 1960s CYC Youth member Dave ‘Shorty’ Shaw competed in the positions of navigator and mast man, respectively, on Canada 1 at the 1983 America’s Cup. CYC sailors competed in other annual sailing competitions this past season: the CYC Icebreaker Regatta at Chestermere, Prairie Winds Regatta at Newell Lake and Sail Canada’s Sail West Championship at Lake Wabamun where CYC sailors dominated the podium: Isaac Bussin ( 1st in ILCA 7), Lesley Reichenfeld (1st in ILCA 6), Lee Nagy (2nd in ILCA 6) Bernice Cao (1st in ILCA 4), Zairyn Mireau (2nd in ILCA 4) Samuel Mierau (1st in Optimist), Finley Hoffmann (2nd in Optimist), U17 Regional Champs in C420 Barrett Duff and Aryan Virk, and U17 Regional Champ in ILCA 4 Zairyn Mierau. In August, CYC celebrated Chestermere’s own Brianna
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