Exuma Sailing Club 2023 recap
2023 was an amazing year from start to finish for the Exuma Sailing Club. This year ESC team members competed in eleven regattas, including the National Family Island Regatta, the Long Island Regatta, Opti Nationals, and Sunfish Junior Nationals.
At the 2023 Opti National Championships in Nassau the ESC took a team of 6 sailors, three in the rookie green fleet and three in the advanced championship fleet. For the second year in a row, they had a new sailor win the green fleet, Treysean McKenzie, brother of last year's winner Tyreese McKenzie.
Treysean McKenzie
For the first time this year, ESC hosted another National event: The 2023 Sunfish Junior Nationals in Elizabeth Harbour. The event had fourteen sailors from Exuma and ten sailors from Nassau. Joss Knowles of the ESC placed 3rd overall out of twenty four boats and lost only to the two current best junior sailors in The Bahamas from Nassau.
In the end, the regatta was a huge success even though the wind was very high, some of the newer sailors struggled, and many boats broke down. All of the visiting sailors enjoyed themselves and are looking forward to the next event, which is forecasted to be next year.
In late November, two of the top junior sailors, Joss Knowles and Tanaj Manos, traveled to Nassau to compete in the Sunfish Open Championship against adult veteran sailors. Joss sailed amazingly and was leading the final race which would have crowned him the champion of the regatta except the wind died and that race was canceled, which resulted in him coming in second overall.
Since December last year, when The Exuma Sailing Club lost to the team from Lyford Cay in the final race of the 2022 Best of the Best Regatta, one of the major goals this year was to take revenge and win the 2023 Best of the Best Regatta.
ESC was represented by 3 E class boats:
One Bahamas (Tanaj Manos), Mako (Emit Knowles), and last year's runner-up Lady Kayla (Joss Knowles). Several other ESC sailors sailed in other private E Class boats as well. The three ESC boats sailed well from the beginning of the regatta and swept the top three finishes in two out of three races, and Lady Kayla won every single race. All three ESC boats qualified for the “winner take all” final race on Sunday, boasting three out of the five finalist boats.
Joss Knowles
This time, Joss in Lady Kayla won the overall championship, completing a four-race clean sweep of the E class series. No E class boat has ever swept all four races in a major regatta ever! This was a major goal that they trained for and were able to accomplish this year. The best of our performance boats in this one event netted $4,300 for the Exuma Sailing Club in prize money from the four races.
Another major focus in 2023 was to secure the A class boat Lady M from Staniel Cay. While progress has been made and both the ESC and the interested parties in Staniel Cay are in agreement for the acquisition of the boat, as of December 2023 Lady M still remains in Staniel Cay and work has not begun on her yet. ESC remains committed to this endeavor and will continue to work to make it happen.
Another great win for the club this year was that the Prime Minister, the Hon. Philip Brave Davis, while naming sailing as the Bahamas’ National Sport at the 2023 National Family Island Regatta, also verbally committed to giving the ESC the property adjacent to where the club currently operates, giving us the green light to begin planning the layout for our future clubhouse building and boat building shed. A big focus of 2024 will be officially securing the property and fundraising for the clubhouse building.
The ESC membership grew at the end of the summer after the annual Learn to Sail Camp. The Sunfish fleet is currently at sixteen sailors and the Opti fleet is at twelve sailors.
Thanks to the continued funding from the Friends of Exuma the ESC have once again been able to grow this year, keep the fleet in good shape, and are preparing for another great year in 2024.
Update provided by Dallas Knowles of the Exuma Sailing Club
