With a great success and under the auspices of WIMRA, the first Women’s Match Race Clinic in Greece became a reality in the Nautical Club of Palaion Faleron, February 20-22, 2009.
Despite the low temperatures and under the training instructions and supervision of Luigi Bertini (ITA - IU), the participants responded with enthusiasm to an exciting new (for Greek standards) game at sea using Ynglings provided by Sofia Bekatorou (GRE).
16 sailors (12 Greek and 4 Italian) attended the clinic, most of them advanced sailors but newcomers in match racing, full of enthusiasm to listen to Luigi. People from the Nautical Club of Palaio Faliro helped us on shore and in the water and Vana Vlastaki of course was a huge help. We have used two Yngling boats and spare crew could follow the session on water into three tenders, so we had the chance to do some changes . Every day we eat dinner all together in the club and of course have fun discussing about penalties!!!
The first day we did theory in the morning discussing about MR , the calendar of events , the course, the box , the rules and some basic exercises solo. Then we did practice for 3 hours with 16 knots north wind ,which is very cold and very shifty! We finished the day with a long debriefing about Dial up, sailing in reverse, exit dial up, time on distance... All of the keys to match race starting!
The Saturday and Sunday sessions saw more discussion on theory including Rules, Calls, Umpiring System followed by more on the water exercises and racing.
At the end we were all very satisfied and we were asking Luigi about the next clinic!
For more information on Match Racing in Greece, contact Nonika Oikonomopoulou - o_nonika -at- yahoo.com)
