| The Anguilla Youth Sailing Club (AYSC) is going back to school. After a busy summer which saw almost 50 sailors attend the Club’s camp over a six-week period, the Club’s new instructor, Hazen Grant, will be opening his doors to students after school from Monday 5 September. |
The After School Programme will offer a full range of classes for all ages and abilities. Assistant Sailing Coach, Ethan ‘Rumple’ Lloyd, says, “Anyone that comes to the school loves it. It gives us something good to do and it gives us skills that we didn’t have before”.
Beach Camp on Saturday mornings is for younger children not yet ready to sail by themselves. It is a fun introduction to sailing which also teaches swimming and offers art and craft activities to keep the kids entertained. More importantly, it fosters a love of the ocean while building children’s confidence. One seven-year old fan told her mother: “Sailing Camp is so much fun! Oh how I wish sailing camp was every day”. For sailors just starting their sailing career (sailing levels one and two), classes will be held on Mondays and Wednesdays. More advanced sailors (sailing levels three and four) will be taught on Tuesdays and Thursdays. And Anguilla’s racing team, fresh from their Gold Medals triumph in the Premier’s Cup International Youth Regatta in Tortola this summer, will train on Saturdays. At the end of the term, students receive a report, from the Instructor which outline their achievements and how they can continue to improve. Each student who graduates to the next sailing level receives an achievement patch and the knowledge that he/she is advancing in a sport that can take him/her anywhere he/she wants to go. Hazen, who arrived on Anguilla in July, loved spending time with the kids during camp and is excited to have found some talented new potential in the sailors who attended. Hazen says, “I’m looking forward to having these students back in the after school programme and helping them graduate to the next skill level. I’ve got my eyes on a few students who will soon make great additions to Anguilla’s racing team”. The Sailing Club racing team participates in regattas around the region, including St Bart’s, Puerto Rico and St. Martin. At each event, the sailors grow and acquire more confidence. As Rumple noted, “We see that there’s a bigger world than Anguilla”. For more information about the sailing classes available in the After School Programme, please call Hazen Grant on 584 SAIL (7245), or email aysc@sailanguilla.com. For information on how you can support the work of the non-profit Anguilla Sailing Association, please visit www.sailanguilla.com. – Contributed |
