Newport Harbor Sailing Foundation: Sailor Stories

Samanta Hemans at 2020 Open Orange Bowl Regatta

Results

I would like to thank you for giving me the opportunity to travel to Florida to sail in the 2020 58th Annual Open Orange Bowl Regatta at the Coconut Grove Sailing Club in Coconut Grove, Miami. This was a very good experience for me to get more racing under my belt. I was very fortunate that during this regatta we had all types of wind. This helped me get better in every wind condition or situation.

We arrived about a week before the regatta, and I trained with Emily Bornarth for 3 days. I was very lucky to have her train with me before the regatta, because my crew Noble was not available. Training with Emily helped me get a better feel of the boat in the Miami waves and inconsistent chop.  I was also very fortunate to have Emily's brother, Trevor, coaching me throughout the regatta and for the three practice days with Emily. We did practice starts and races, and also straight line boat speed. Trevor was coaching another team, Cole and Elizabeth, so we had another boat to spar with.

Having that other boat made life easier, because we were able to determine what was making us go faster or slower than the other boat. Overall, that made both boats better. 

I had one day to practice with Noble before the actual regatta started. It was really light so we couldn't get too much in. But that light day practice helped us with the first two days of the regatta. Because it was very light and shifty, we were postponed quite a bit. We only got two races off the first day because of the postponements. The second day wasn't much better. We were postponed again and only got three races off. But those were challenging races because the wind and the shifts are not what we were was used to. It took a little time for me to get better at watching the water, but once I got more familiar with the conditions, we started to see our scores improve.

The third day was my favorite day.  We performed well, which was very nice. It was a little breezier than the first two days, about fourteen knots. This was enough to get Noble on the wire, and enough wind for me to be able to get on a plane on a reach. I was very proud of how we performed the third day.

The fourth day of racing was very tough.  There was more wind, and Noble and I were doing fine in it.  But as we approached the finish on the last downwind leg, we pitch poled because my rudder got caught on something. We had to retire, so that was our throw out.  The last race we scored well as we kept out boat upright and passed quite a few boats on the downwind legs. Racing in more breeze like the last day helped me get a better feel on what the boat can do.

Thank you so much for the opportunity to sail in Florida. I'm very excited to be going back again to sail in the i420 North Americans Championships, and then Midwinter's.  All these regatta’s generate points for the i420 US Team for the Worlds in Italy.  The photo is of me, Trevor Bornarth, Emily Bornarth and Elizabeth Wire as we rig to get ready for practice.

Thank you,

Samantha Hemans