Andrew Noble, the team manager of the combined Garin/Nayland 420s sailing team has given us some great photos and a report back about the top of the South 420's Intercollegiate Sailing Regatta held in Picton recently.

On the evening of Wednesday 27 March the Combined Garin/Nayland College 420’s sailing team travelled to their accommodation at the Picton Top 10 holiday park ready for an early morning briefing for the start of sailing. 

At the Top 10 were Nelson College for Girls sailors and one of the Christchurch teams. Sailing started at 10:30am in mixed conditions that all sailors found challenging as the wind was unpredictable with the yachts being in calm water one moment then all of a sudden 20knot gusts from various different directions. 

 The team started the day in Silver Fleet and at the end of the day remained in silver fleet. Friday brought a cold start with consistent light southerly winds making it an easier days sailing. As with Thursday the team started in silver fleet and ended Friday in the same position. Saturday morning brought cool fine weather with no wind and at 11am the Saturday morning racing was called off,

The Garin Nayland team finished in silver fleet in the same seeding position as they started.

In terms of college order we finished 10th out of 14 schools competing and 5th out of the seven Nelson teams (the larger colleges had two teams each – with the Nayland Garin Combined team being ahead of the other colleges second teams

Local Schools attending were Nelson College, Nelson College for Girls, Waimea College and the Garin Nayland Combined team.

The students attending were Ella Holmes Nayland, Angus McMahon Nayland, Brennan Drach Garin, Ella Fidler Garin, Killian Cools Garin and John noble Garin – David Ashley Garin – reserve

As the manager I was impressed with the atmosphere of the whole event with all the teams competing getting on well with each other. The level of skill and dedication to training was impressive with all teams putting in many hours of training over the summer terms.

I have particularly enjoyed managing this combined Garin Nayland team who have been a great team of young sailors to work with and an absolute credit to their respective schools.

The link below is a to a closed facebook group for the combined team and you are most welcome once joined to remove or share photos for use on the schools Facebook sports pages or school newsletters

https://www.facebook.com/groups/346583566198501/

Report supplied by Andrew Noble (Parent and Team Manager)