Two Harbour Training

Published 21:42 on 1 Jun 2020

Two Harbour Training

Emsworth Sailing Club is excited to announce plans to extend the Two Harbour training: it will now include RS Feva, RS Aero and Laser coaching as well as RS Tera!

The training was set up two years ago to provide an opportunity for young sailors to build on the skills they have learnt through the RYA levels and gain confidence to race away from home. The coaching is delivered by top-class coaches and the ratio of students to coach is kept high to enable individualised sessions.

Through these two years, the number of young sailors has grown from 22 to 36 and these sailors have travelled from all over the south of England to join the fun. Sailors from clubs such as Itchenor, Felpham, Lancing, Christchurch and Erith in Kent joined ESC as temporary members to use the facilities and enjoy the waters of Chichester Harbour.

The coaching team ranges from talented young local coaches including Henry Chandler and Patrick Bonner, 2000 winter series winners Simon Horsefield and Katie Burridge and ex-British Sailing Team 49erFX helm, Vikki Payne. The coaches work hard to ensure all sailors received personalised feedback and use video in debriefs to help the sailors to fully understand the sessions. The weekends are structured to allowed small coaching groups to focus on skills on the Saturday followed by a race day on the Sunday. This allows the sailors to put into practice the skills they work on during the training sessions.

For the Sears family, from Christchurch Sailing Club, mum Cherie said, "Two Harbour Squads has been a fantastic experience. We have been made to feel so welcome and the team has gone out of their way to support the needs of my child without making him feel different. Inclusivity at its best. Hope to be back next year!"

We are now excited to say that we are making plans to extend this training to the single-handed classes of the RS Aero and Laser and the double-handed class of the RS Feva! Applications will open in August with the first weekends currently scheduled for October.

We hope now that the harbour is open, you are able to get out on the water safely and enjoy the sun and wind!

Stay safe.

Vikki Payne