It was a good idea to do the Monnickendam - Medemblik trip on Saturday, because Sunday started out a bit rainy and ended up with 30 Knots of wind in the gusts, not too comfortable for a 28 nMile IJsselmeer voyage. But by then we were safely tucked away in our berth in the marina of the Medemblik Regatta Centre, where over 500 boats in the Olympic classes (including the 2.4 mR class, which is open to Olympic as well as Paralympic sailors) will be doing battle this week.
There are a total of around 800 individual competitors from 61 countries (including South Africa: Asenati Jim a.k.a. 'Squirrel' and Roger Hudson in a 470). Many of them are hopefuls for the 2012 Olympics, so you walk into 'heroes' like Torben Greal and Robert Scheidt, both Brazileans now sailing the Star. Also the 1996 (Langebaan) Optimist World Champion, Lisa Westerfhof is here, she by now has 2 * 470 World Titles under her belt, her crew Lobke Berkhout has Olympic silver and 5 Worlds Golds. So not a measly bit of sailing here this week. Lyn is the host in the Press Centre and I am the "Speaker" for the regatta, commenting for competitors and the public about 'what's going on'. That's not because I have a reputation of being a good speaker but they needed someone who knows a bit about sailing and is fluent in both Duch and English. So here I am, doing a job I've never done before!
Registration is almost finished now (Monday evening) and sailing starts tomorrow and will last until Sunday when the Medal Races are sailed. See http://www.deltalloydregatta.org/ or follow the regatta on Twitter and / or on Facebook (see, I have done my bit of advertsing). The idea is that results, down to markrounding positions, will be uploaded to Twitter as they come in. There are 2 people full time busy with this! How different to the results of the Western Cape Dinghy Champiships which were not on the championship internet site 4 weeks after the regatta (maybe still not, I have given up trying).
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