In the offshore sailing world, there are very few youth sailors and even fewer young female offshore sailors. It is more difficult for female youth sailors to gain access to offshore sailing and even harder to gain leadership positions. In the 2021 Annapolis to Newport Race, only 15% of the competitors were women. In the 75 years of running the race, there has yet to be an all-female team. One of the major initiatives of Leading the Change! is female youth ocean racing development. The average age of the crew on our boat is 26. I’m a junior in high school and will be the youngest of the crew at age 16. Lily Flack (20) a junior in college and Callie Dawson (17) a senior in high school will be the other youth on the boat. I am super excited to learn from incredible teammates. I am especially excited to learn from Chelsea Carlson-Freas about weather routing and navigation on board. Sailing, math and science, three of my favorite things!
We are about 2 weeks away from the start, and I have already learned so much. Planning an offshore campaign takes time and dedication. We have been having weekly Zoom meetings since the end of February. Shout out to When2Meet for helping us coordinate our busy schedules! I have learned so much about fundraising methods. About two weeks ago, Emma Janson and I gave a presentation about the campaign to local sailors in our area. We spoke about the missions of our campaign and why the missions are so important to us. Doing this presentation I learned about public speaking and preparing for a presentation. Overall, the presentation went very well.
We only have a few meetings on Zoom left until we meet in person! Our training weekend is quickly approaching. Each practice day has a specific practice goal such as man overboard practice, emergency steering, and sail changes. We are also planning to do an overnight sail. Safety is our top priority, and almost our entire crew has international offshore safety at sea certification. As of the time I am writing this blog post, we have 22,142 minutes until the start!