Record Breaking Optimist Sailing at Lake Garda
NYC Optimist sailor Loghlen Rickard joined 1054 others, including 6 Irish, in the 2013 Lake Garda Meeting in Italy this Easter weekend. It was classified as being one of the largest single-class regattas in the world and a Guinness World Record was broken.
Four Irish sailors, including Loghlen, made the Gold Fleet for the final day of racing with winds picking up for the finals. In the end, Harry Durcan placed 33rd overall (the top Irish result) and Loghlen came in 125th place – very good results given the number of boats (1000 boats in the fleet) and the quality of the competition (top national sailors from 30 nations).
Winds were uncharacteristically light for Garda with no racing on the first day, Good Friday. On Easter Saturday and Sunday the sailors completed 2 races per day with Loghlen’s best result being a 12th and Irish sailor Harry Durcan (RCYC) getting a bullet in race 2 and was in 2nd place overall.
Well done Loghlen!
