Canadian News

While the ice went out on our lake early this spring, COVID 19 has played havoc with the start of our sailing season. While the Victoria members have been sailing regularly on Wednesday afternoons and on Saturdays, Members in Ontario and Quebec are now seeing their provincial lockdowns slowly being eased and access to sailing and yacht clubs returning to near normal. At my club (Nepean Sailing Club in Ottawa), the large keelboats are being launched June 5 so our first 2.4mR sails will begin after that. We look forward to the easing of provincial travel restrictions and even travel restrictions within provinces (between health units in British Columbia, for example).

The continuing closure of the Canada-United States border is having a detrimental effect on both the recovery of boats and equipment trapped in Florida since March 2020 and the delivery of new boats that have been shipped to Florida in containers along with US boats. At this point there are at least five boats, three trailers, one vehicle and lots of equipment stuck in Florida. It does not appear that the Canada- US border will be open for what is called “non-essential travel” until at least late July 2021. Is not sailing 2.4mR sailboats an essential activity for our mental health?

Almost all of our boat owners have renewed their membership thanks to Brian Robinson, our new class Secretary, Aaron Wong-Sing, our Treasurer, who did a great job revising our website-based membership renewal system, and to all the members who have renewed their membership for the 2021 – 2022 year.  If you haven’t renewed your membership, please go to https://www.canada24mr.com/canadian-class-membership-2021/ and complete the membership registration form. This year, we have reduced our full membership from $50.00 to $40.00. We also have an associate membership category for individuals who are not boat owners but are supporters of the Canadian 2.4mR class, and an association membership for Provincial Sailing Associations, community groups and similar organizations who own one or more boats that their members use jointly.

The Victoria fleet and Royal Victoria Yacht Club are working hard to organize a successful 2021 Canadian 2.4mR Championship September 10 – 12^th. The regatta chair, Randy Diamond is an experienced organizer and has a great team working to make this a special regatta. They have a dedicated website http://www.2pt4canadians.com/, which is loaded with useful information. For planning purposes, the organizers are asking sailors considering attending to contact them early. The regatta registration is open, and they are not requesting regatta entry fees until a later date. If you have any questions, you can contact the organizing committee directly at [dot][dot][dot][at][dot].

If you have recently sold your 2.4mR, we would appreciate you dropping a note to the class Secretary at [at][dot] , giving us information about the buyer including name, e-mail address, telephone number, hull number and sail number of the boat sold. If you are keeping your personal sail number because you own more than one boat, we will contact the new owner to issue them a sail number. Of course, we would like to welcome the new owner into the class and provide them with information about regattas etc. We also maintain a data base including current measurement and buoyancy certificate information on all known boats in Canada. We will amend the ownership information on file.

This is also a reminder that boats with Floatation Certificates dated 2016 or earlier must be retested in 2021 in accordance with Class Rule B4. In Victoria, please contact Bruce Millar, Chief Measurer, and in Toronto, contact David Foscarini. In other locations, contact Bruce Millar to identify acceptable alternative measurers.

International News       

A number of positive initiatives are coming from the Executive Committee of the International Class Association. First, the class is updating the look and content of the class website to give it a more modern feel and make it more appealing to the general sailing public while still providing the information class members require. The new revised class website should be online in the later part of July. Second, the EC of the class is asking whether the next AGM should be a virtual meeting. The exact proposition is as follows:

Should the EC run an AGM/Special Meeting in order to hear from NCA representatives and conduct the business of running the class including elections and approval for other class business. This meeting will take place over Zoom and be run in a professional no biased manner by an experienced professional moderator.

Please let the International Class Secretary [dot][at][dot] know your views on this matter.

The third initiative taken by Heiko Kroeger was to prepare and submit an application for the 2.4mR to be added as a mixed event in the 2024 Paris Olympics. As a background, the IOC rejected World Sailing’s recommend class the “doublehanded long-distance event” for among other reasons World Sailing had not run a World championship in the event. On very short notice the International Class put together a submission which was not successful. However, the class learned from the experience and believe it did raise the profile of the class at World Sailing.

Finally, we are receiving reports from the German 2.4mR class and appreciate that they are sharing their ideas of how to grow the class. These, and reports from other National Class Associations (NCA’s) will be posted on the website.

Stay healthy and get your vaccination so we can all sail together soon.

Peter Wood
CAN 14