2018 Optimist Nationals

The Port Denison Sailing Club had 6 representatives at the 2018 Australian Optimist Championships held from January 3rd to 10th at the Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron in Manly, Brisbane.  It was a fantastic week with some great results. Three Bowen sailors entered the Green Fleet Class, with Jack Scharf winning and becoming Australian Optimist Green Fleet Champion after winning 5 of the 19 races, Callum McNee came 17th with his best place being a 3rd and Levi Downs finished 22nd with a best placing 2nd in one of the 19 races out of the 48 Green Fleet sailor from across the country that competed.  

       

In the Intermediate class, PDSC had Sam Belyea who sailed his Optimist Sirocco and finish 19th, his best result was a 7th in the last race sailing against a fleet of 76. Great effort from Sam in his first national titles.

In the Open Optimist Class there was a total of 135 boats competing including 12 international sailors. The open fleet was divided into a gold and a silver fleet after 3 days of qualifying. PDSC sailor Talia Bulstrode, came 45th in the gold fleet which had 68 boats and was 4th Queenslander and first QLD Girl sailing her boat Go Girl Go. Isabella Bruce sailing her boat Go Your Own Way was very unlucky to miss out on gold fleet by 1 point. Isabella ended up 14th in the silver fleet competing against 67 boats, her best place was 2nd in the last race. She was 2nd QLD girl and 7th QLD sailors overall. Awesome achievement for these two girls who are now some of the top female sailors in the country.

Talia Bulstrode who travels from Innisfail every second weekend to train with the PDSC squad ,also won the Australian Sabot Championship over the Christmas break before she sailed in the Optimists titles. After a well deserved break, Talia will be back in action for PDSC, leading our squad to a successful 2018.

Two of PDSC coaches also represented QLD with Aidan Gummow coaching the QLD green fleet and Gary Bruce coaching the QLD intermediate fleet. Both coaches have already started preparations for the PDSC squad to compete in the QLD titles to be held in Bowen on the May Day weekend.

The Australian titles was not only a great success for the sailors and coaches of PDSC but also the large number of parents and volunteers that work hard every weekend to keep our 154yr old club running. After a lot of hard work PDSC is once again a dominate force on the Australian sailing scene.

A massive thanks to the McLean family from the Grandview Hotel for their continued support of PDSC and Bird's Fish Bar at Bowen Fishermans Seafood Co, for donating the $100 Seafood voucher that we raffled to raise money for Bowen Junior Sailors that competed.