Christmas Greetings
A Christmas Message from the President QRYA
December 2019
On behalf of the QRYA Committee and myself, I would like to wish all Club members and their families, a joyous Christmas, a happy and safe festive period, and a prosperous New Year.
2019 has been year packed with lots of fun and success in our sailing activities around the State. I believe our membership can have confidence that our Association is moving forward into 2020 in a strong position. We are in a strong financial position and our Committee is developing strategies to encourage increased participation in our traditional classes and support the new DF classes.
We saw a very successful National Championship staged at Regatta Waters, a new venue capable of providing fair and competitive race courses with first-rate facilities for parking, food and amenities. This venue was achieved through the hard work of the QRYA Committee with the assistance of the Manly and Paradise Clubs providing the infrastructure required to hold an event of such magnitude. We now have a good working relationship with the Southport Yacht club and Gold Coast Council who control this facility.
The DF 65 fleets continued accelerated growth through the year to the point where it is now a major Class within our ranks.
We saw the introduction of a new and soon to be National Class of DF 95s. We successfully held our initial DF 95 State Championship in Townsville. It was great to see the Townsville Club again holding major Regattas at their excellent facility in the far North and we look forward to more in 2020
We have introduced a new way of communicating with the Classes through the Class Coordinators. This point of contact has enabled the QRYA to work with the classes resulting in increased fleet numbers for the 10R, Marbleheads, 65s and 95s. Recently this process produced the largest fleet of Marbleheads at a Regional Championship for many years.
We welcomed a new Vice President, Trent Jarratt to our Committee recently. Trent is the Commodore of the Paradise Radio Yacht Club our largest club in Queensland and he brings a wealth of experience and knowledge to our Committee.
A new QRYA Facebook site has been established by our Publicity Officer and is currently being developed to provide and receive social and informative posts. We hope to expand the participation of members on this site in future activities.
For the coming year, the good news is that there is much more to look forward to in 2020.
In the coming year we can look forward to the introduction of a new system of allocating events to the Classes. We will have 7 Classes of RC Yachts supported by our Association where we intend to hold a minimum of 3 Regattas per class. They will take the form of a State Championship and 2 Regional Championships. These events will be the basis for awarding a Grand Prix Champion for each Class for the year. This we hope will become a prestigious recognition for the best Competitor for the year across all 3 events. We have developed an honour role in our Website to recognise our Grand Prix Champions.
We will again see Australia’s most prestigious and popular IOM Regatta sailed at Regatta Waters venue next June. The Eddie Cowell Perpetual Trophy has been given to the QRYA to be sailed as a stand alone regatta and double as a lead up to the National Championships to be held one month later.
The Paradise Club has recently offered to host the National RC Laser Championships. Paradise has a vast depth of knowledge and experience in running events of this stature at Emerald Waters and we look forward to another successful National Championship in Queensland. It is expected that there will be in excess of 40 competitors at this event.
We intend to work with the Class Coordinators and Clubs to encourage regular club racing for the traditional classes. We will be working with the Class Coordinators and the Classes themselves to continue to increase the participation of competitors at the scheduled 3 events.
It is our intention to assist our member clubs to train Race Officers and Scorers from within their own ranks. The training courses currently exist and links can be found on the QRYA Website. Our Committee is available to anybody who requires advice or assistance in this area. The future of our sport is dependant on the ability of Clubs to provide members to officiate our regattas.
To better understand our membership and the conditions under which they sail, it is my intention to get out and about in the New Year to visit different venues. It will be an opportunity to view facilities that I previously hadn't seen and the members I haven’t yet met. I hope to better appreciate the needs of members and discuss how we can be a better QRYA. I hope to have a sail while I’m there.
As we head into the coming year it is my firm belief that we can look forward to an environment where RC sailing both traditional and developing classes will continue to thrive and grow into the future.
All the Best
Geoffrey Morris
President QRYA
