Story by Gary Thorne

Congratulations to Puzant Ozbag Zorayan for advancing to the B fleet recently, and to Bill Symes and Mike Kennedy for advancing to the A fleet!  Puzant won the C division in the BYC Nov. Sunkist and the NHYC Feb. Winter Series.  Bill won the B division in the Feb. 17-18 WD Schock Memorial Regatta at NHYC, while Mike won the BYC January Sunkist and a 2023 regatta in B.

Want to move up?  Just win two days of racing in your division, with at least five boats racing in the division.  In the Weiss Series, each of the three days counts as a day of racing, as does each Sunkist and Winter Series day.  If you win a two-day event like the WD Schock Memorial Regatta, you move up immediately, as Bill Symes did.

One secret to success is to race regularly in weekend regattas, such as Weiss #2-3 on 4/7 and 5/19, and Midsummer on 8/4.  (Sorry, summer evenings and Friday Frolics don’t count.  Look for high-point races in red or green font on the fleet calendar at harbor20.org/fleet-1-newport-beach/calendar/.)  Another secret is to encourage fellow sailors to come out so we have at least five boats in each division.

Once you’ve moved up, you have a year to place in a regatta in order to stay in your new division.  For instance, if you win the B division in the WD Schock Memorial Regatta, a 2-day event, you have until next year’s WD Schock Memorial Regatta to place in A, or you’ll go back to B after that regatta.  (To see what it means to “place,” see Appendix A of the fleet bylaws at harbor20.org/fleet-1-newport-beach/organization/bylaws/.  By the way, once you move up to A, you never go back to C, even if you don’t race for a while.  Also, you can stay in A forever by winning the fleet championship.)

Even if you don’t win two regattas during the year, keep racing–you may win one of the season high-point trophies!  (See harbor20.org/fleet-1-newport-beach/awards/high-point-series/ for the standings.)