The ANZ Sailing Fun Day hosted by the Fiji Hobie Class Racing Association ("Fleet 252") at the Suva Foreshore on 24th July was a resounding success as 6 local youth teams competed against 3 youth teams from Wallis in the harbour while a market day was held onshore for onlookers.
Fiji Hobie developed the Fun Day initiative to create awareness of sailing amongst the public and to attract more youths into the sport.
Fiji is the first South Pacific country to host such a Youth Challenge, which will create a class of competition solely for youths and will aid in preparing them to participate competitively in international regattas. The Youth Challenge will be held annually and is open to all youth teams internationally and will be preceded by a youth training clinic. The training clinic this year was conducted by Grahame Southwick (“Fish”), President of Fleet 252 and Aaron Worrall, former Hobie 16 World champion and current Hobie 17 champion.
The Youth Challenge also served as a warm-up for the three top scoring local youth teams to participate in the Air Pacific Oceania Championships held at The Pearl Resort & Spa in Pacific Harbour on 31st July and 1st August. The local youth teams, mainly comprised of underprivileged youths from squatter settlements around Suva, were able to participate in this event thanks to the generous support of their principal sponsor, ANZ, as well and Suzuki Marine and Total, who provided outboard motors and fuel for the judges boats and safety boats.
We were especially pleased to welcome three teams from Wallis. Team Wallis Coach Louis-Henry Chardigny was overjoyed that one of his teams placed third behind two local Fiji teams with much more sailing experience.
Moape Dramainavesi, 19, and Vesito Rauluni, 12, won the inaugural 2010 Pacific Youth Sailing Challenge and were awarded their prizes by ANZ Bank manager Ray Best at The Royal Suva Yacht Club on Sunday July 25th. Wallis Team Coach, Louis-Henry was delighted that one of the Wallis teams came third as the Wallis contingency only has one Hobie boat back home while the local Fiji youth teams have access to many boats and practice sailing every weekend.
Any youth teams wishing to join us for the 2011 event please contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .
