British team success for Bosham Boats!
Published 10:08 on 31 May 2023
We are really proud to share the news that over the summer four of our cadets will be flying the Bosham burgee as well as the GBR flag at international events having successfully been selected for Team GBR in the Oppie, 420 and ILCA/Laser classes.
India Eastwood will compete as part of the GBR team for the second year running at the Optimist European Championships having been ranked 3rd girl and 9th overall at the Optimist selection trials earlier this month. She will be going to Thessaloniki, Greece in mid-July. Quite simply an outstanding achievement.
Pippa Shepherd qualified for the GBR Development team that will be going to Cascais, Portgual for training with one of the world's best optimist coaches followed by 2 days competing Mirpuri Foundation Sailing Trophy. Pippa ranked 10th girl or 4th U13 girl at the Optimist selection trials.
Zac Shepherd and Arthur Southall have been selected to be part of the GBR U17 team at the 420 Worlds which takes place in Alicante in Spain. This follows their brilliant pairing at Bosham Junior Week 2022 in a Feva with Zac winning all three big harbour events last year (Itchenor Junior Fortnight, Bosham Junior Week and Chichester Harbour Federation Week).
After spending the winter as a member of the RYA GBR Youth Squad in an ILCA 6/Laser Radial, James has now transitioned to the ILCA 7/Laser standard rig which is the male Olympic single-handed class. He has now popped out of the Youth category and is competing against fully-fledged world class adult sailors. At his first event he finished 6th out of 27 winning Gold medal for 1st U19 (Youth sailor). This has resulted in him being selected for Team GBR at the European ILCA 7 U21 Championships in Stavangar, Norway in August.
Its worth highlighting that all these sailors started sailing oppies at BSC in Cutmill and going through the BSC training programme before progressing to Class and RYA training. We are hoping to organise an informal session for keen children and parents on training and sailing opportunities beyond Bosham (although we all know that Bosham is best) but in the mean time, please do contact any of the Shepherd, Eastwood or Curtis families. As a starter, if anyone wishes to apply for the Regional Training Groups for 2023/24 they will need to participate at the Regional Champs in Oxford on 18/19th June.
Last updated 11:51 on 12 March 2024
