DOB: 10/17/1982
Doncaster, England
DOB: 7/9/1981
Bayport, NY
DOB: 4/13/1979
San Diego, CA
DOB: 11/03/1981
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
DOB: 04/07/1996
Guana Bay, Sint Maarten
Mozambique
DOB: 05/05/1986
Lymington, UK
I made it to the 2013 Reebok CrossFit Games! After seven events/WOD’s over three days at Regionals, it came down to the last day to decide the final spots for qualifying for the Games which will be held in Carson, CA in July.
Read the rest of 2nd At Regionals Qualifies For ’13 Reebok CrossFit Games »
Atricle featured on Reebok CrossFit Games
At 13, Anna Tunnicliffe decided she wanted to win an Olympic medal in sailing. And she did, taking gold in the Laser Radial class at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.
“(It’s) the most amazing feeling in the world,” she says. “Not too many people can say they’ve won one.”
Now 30, Tunnicliffe began training at CrossFit B&S in Miami about a year and a half ago.
“I was fit, but I was just not getting fitter. I wasn’t getting stronger,” she explains. “I started CrossFit, and just mixing it up the way it did … immediately took my fitness level up.”
Her sailing also improved, she adds, and she became mentally stronger on the water.
Today, Tunnicliffe has a new goal: qualify for the CrossFit Games.
Last year, she qualified for the South East Regional, but the competition was a week before the Olympic trails. This year, she placed 13th in the Open, though she actually doesn’t know that.
“I don’t want to know where I rank because … it gets to you mentally. Like when I’m sailing, I don’t look at my scores. I don’t know where I am because, ultimately, it doesn’t matter until the end. As long as you give your best effort, that’s all you can do.”
She will compete at the South East Regional May 17 to 19.
Molly and I wrapped up, on Thursday, four awesome days of sailing in San Francisco Bay. We sailed every day in the building breeze and sunshine. We had conditions ranging from 4-18kts and flat to choppy water. It was brilliant to get back in the boat, and notice huge improvements every day.
All Photos: © Team Tunnicliffe 2013
Many of the people following the world cup sailing circuit and have been checking out my site may have some questions for me at the moment. Where are you? What are you doing? Why aren’t you in Palma? The answer is simple, I’m getting ready. After the Midwinters at the end of February I had a short ski trip, sailed the Bacardi Cup with “Touch 2 Play” and then got myself focused on the month of May and the regattas in Garda and Holland. I called my trainer Sheldon Persad and told him it was time to get my body dangerous again. Working hard in the gym, getting stronger, fitter, and faster is a big part of being ready to perform. My coach Steve and I decided that it was less important for me to do every event, but rather hit the events we choose hard so we are following that plan.
What that means for me is plenty of hurt physically, plenty of cold weather sailing here in Toronto, and plenty of time thinking about the warm spring regatta season. Have a look at a few pics from last week’s gym sessions.
After finishing up the racing at the 3rd of 4 World Cup events, Maclaren Crew Member Nick Thompson finished in 16th position of 119 Laser sailors.
With results ranging from mid-20’s to a 3rd, Nick has been consistently at the top of the fleet. Good work out there Nick!
Mission and History
The Peninsula Youth Sailing Foundation (PYSF) is a non-profit 501c (3) organization that was formed in the year 2000. From its inception, PYSF has been dependent on the support of volunteers and donations from the community for its success. Their primary mission is to coach, teach, and nurture youth sailors in the San Francisco Bay Area by providing instruction, coaching, practice, and racing opportunities.
After finishing up a 2012 Olympic Campaign, finishing 5th in the Elliot 6M women’s match racing, Molly O’Bryan Vandemoer was hired as the Director and Head Coach. Since her hire, the foundation has experienced a boom in both participation and overall organization. In her own words, “Before leaving for the Games I knew I was going to need something to keep me busy when I returned. And the PYSF job certainly has done that! The program was in need of a full-time director to help instill consistent organization, practices, and a logical plan for the kids and parents to follow.”
Sailing Opportunities
PYSF’s primary sailing area is the Port of Redwood City turning basin, the same home waters of Stanford University. They also have access to open water on South San Francisco Bay, a short 10 minute sail from the basin. Conditions range from 0-5 and very shifty in the winter to 20+ knots nearly every day in the summer. Its South Bay location protects them from the notorious San Francisco summer fog. Most summer days are sunny and 75-85 degrees.
Due to the temperate climate of the Bay Area, PYSF is able to offer programs 12 months a year in 420s, lasers, and Optis. In their year around program, The Foundation currently has 29 kids registered in the high school program, 17 in 420s, 15 in Optis, and 3 in Lasers from ages 8-18. Their Race Teams meet multiple times a week and focus training on long course, boatspeed, and boathandling. The summer is comprised of 4 session that offer everything from learn to sail to advanced racing. PYSF also provides boats for anyone who does not own their own.
(See the schedule here)
In addition to their Junior Racing program, PYSF offers high school sailing to any high school sailor interested. The sailors do not need to be part of an official HS team, and sailing experience is not an absolute requirement. They currently have sailors from over 14 schools. Most schools start sailing Pacific Coast High School Events as Conglomerate Teams, made up of multiple schools. They are allowed a 2-year grace period to get enough sailors to fill an A and B division from the same school. Many local schools have successfully started full sailing teams based off this model. 8th graders are also allowed to practice and compete with PYSF once they complete the Introductory FJ class. To help strengthen the high school program, PYSF just purchased an identical fleet of FJ’s from a college on the East Coast. This will allow them to offer an equal practice platform and host some provided boat events, a rarity on the west coast.
Challenges and Future Plans
In a sense, PYSF has many of the same challenges as all clubs face, participation, funding, etc, but without the structure and sometimes burdensome yacht club politics, they are free to set their own agenda. A main goal for them is to “get sailing to be a consistent part of the kids’ over-scheduled lives.” The year-round sailing climate certainly helps with this but they also have a scholarship program to help families with financial need get kids on the water. When asked how scholarships will help PYSF meet challenges and future plans, Molly responded, “Sailing can be an expensive sport and PYSF wants to make sure that the opportunity to get into a sailboat is available to everyone. Our challenge is to grow the sport and instill a love for it. If awarding a scholarship helps me reach another kid, then it is a win for everyone.” Since August, they have awarded three scholarships and expect to get 2-3 more requests through the summer.
As an Olympic racer herself, it’s no surprise that Molly has made racing a primary focus for The Foundation: “I am here to help implement a feeder program for kids from 8-18 years old that will help get more NorCal sailors into the National sailing scene. I would also like to see the program’s healthy learn-to-sail classes feed into more kids racing from ages 10-13.”
The fact that they are the only junior racing program in South San Francisco Bay should also help their cause. Many kids commute more than an hour each way to get good coaching up in the city. Now many of these kids are able to sail more locally. Some have even started high school teams and have been able to bring new people into the sport. As Molly explains, “Most importantly I want to get these kids the opportunity to see how fun the sport is, gain friends with common likes and hopefully go on to their college teams, join area Yacht Clubs, and become sailors for life.”
For more information on PYSF visit their website: http://www.pysf.us/
http://www.sail1design.com/airwaves-sailing-news/sailing-yacht-profiles/1078-pysf
March 28, 2013
Miami, FL
After getting introduced to CrossFit a year and a half ago, it has become my second love to sailing. Knowing that I wanted to take a small break and a slower first year to this upcoming quad, I set a goal of making the CrossFit Games this year, before diving back into full time sailing next year.
CrossFit is “constantly varied functional movements performed at a high intensity.” Meaning we can do anything and everything from Olympic lifting to running to gymnastic movements in one workout. We never know what the workout is going to be until late the evening before so you are always excited to get to the box (gym) the next day.
The CrossFit Games 2013 season started four weeks ago. The season starts with everyone performing one workout a week for five weeks. Anyone around the world can enter, and this year there are over 163,000 people entered. Athletes submit their scores online and then are ranked worldwide and within their region. At the end of the five weeks, the top 48 individuals advance onto the regionals. Regionals is a three day competition from which the top three athletes advance to the Games, a 4 day competition held in California annually.
Each week, the athletes at our box get together on Friday to compete and knockout that week’s wod (workout of the day). This is what I love most about CrossFit…the community around it. It doesn’t matter how strong you are, how fast you are, it’s all about being there and doing the best you can and cheering on your teammates. We have what’s called Friday night lights. We blast the music, we cheer and we work out! It’s an incredible amount of fun with amazing energy.
So like I said, we are on the fourth week. Tomorrow night I will do my fourth wod. I’m not allowed to look at my ranking online, because my coach asked me not to. He and I figure out a goal to try and hit every Friday and he looks to make sure the score was good enough. So far so good, since I haven’t had to repeat any workouts and have hit the score within a rep or two.
Regionals are middle May, and that is what we are training hard for now. But don’t worry, Team Maclaren is still sailing. I leave next Friday to fly to San Francisco to do some training and we have two more sessions in April scheduled. By taking an “easier year” we are just traveling abroad less, we still have our practices going on.
Back to training!
Sail Hard,
Anna
Team Maclaren
Carmeuse is back on board! Molly and I are delighted to announce that Carmeuse has committed to partnering with us again for the next four years as we campaign for the Gold Medal in Rio, 2016. We are very excited by this sponsorship, as Carmeuse has been an integral part of our sailing for over eight years now.
Photo: Mike Anderson/SailingPix 2013
“You’ve got what you’ve got and you do what you can.” “We just got lucky” is how Canadian Laser sailor Dave Wright, a graduate of the United States Merchant Marine Academy at King’s Point, summed up rescuing a missing kiteboarder one night on Banderas Bay, Mexico. The truth is that his level-headed, methodical approach, his persistence, his training and his wits were instrumental in saving that kiter’s life. Wright was in Mexico to train at the International Sailing Academy, because the volcanic ash fiasco in Europe fouled up his trip to the ISAF Sailing World Cup in Hyeres.
Credit – Sailgroove.org
http://www.sailgroove.org/speaker/7485-/video/330484-david-wright-describes-rescue-of-kiteboarder
At the end of 2012, Maria Mabjaia was elected the best female athlete of Mozambique and she won a prize that allowed to go to South Africa for training. Maria just came back from Pretória, South Africa where she spent about 3 weeks sailing and training in the High Performance Center (HPC) for athletes in the University of Pretória and also in other parts of the country. Read the rest of Maria wins best female athlete! »
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Rhone Findlay