How did you get into Spark/Dart 15/Sprint 15 sailing?

[Jenny Ball]

Hi All

It is well known that we sail the best type of boat there is. But we all found the light at different times and in different ways.

How did you first come across the Spark/Dart 15/Sprint 15 and when did you join the fleet?

Would be really interesting to hear everyone's story!

Jenny

[Jenny Ball]

To kick off, here is Simon Hare's story:

Here is something different for 2004, I learnt to sail aged 44, moved straight into racing Lasers for 3 years at Oxford and then the Phantom for the next 3 years, I then joined the Sprint 15s for 5 years, sold the Sprint and moved into the Blaze Fleet before returning to the Sprint 15 after buying 2026.

[Jenny Ball]

And here is mine:

I sailed from childhood starting out in Mirrors. (Plastic learner boats had not been invented). As a teenager, I ended up crewing for other teenagers on Dart 18s and a Hurricane. When I came back from university, I decided to buy a single hander as there was a chance my new career might mean moving around the UK. We already had a good Dart 15 fleet at Marconi, at that time co-ordinated by Bob Anderson who quickly pounced on the opportunity of a new fleet member!

I first bought 1530 from Eamonn Holmes and named her Happy Hour (I think she is at Stewartby now?). Within a couple of years, another Marconi and fleet member, Tim Dieu de Bellefontaine convinced me to buy a new Dart 15 - sail number 1917, who I named Catbert. We were inseparable until 2018 when I bought 2025 and unimaginatively named her Catbert Too.

(1917 remains at Marconi with the Clark family - Dave, Jason and Jemma have all competed with Catbert at various Sprint 15 TTs and Nationals.)

[Liam]

It is actually illegal to sail any other class of boat at Shanklin.

[Kev192]

I learned to sail lasers on a small lake called shearwater, we visited Swanage to do the regatta my first sail on the sea, i was fascinated by the dart 18s. some years later after sailing on the south coast i was given a trip on an 18 and thought wow
eventually after a laser masters event i joined Swanage, One day i was in the car park a guy asked me to help him rig his mast on a sprint 15 we took it down to the beach and into its berth after a while Mike cemm had convinced me to have ago so i crewed in a series for someone and found it very exciting. i had to get my own and by the end of summer 2003 i had bought 1616
when i took it to the beach Mike said oh you have one of my old boats, he always had the matching numbers etc 1717
i kept this boat until i decided i wanted a hurricane and then a further 2 dart 18s and after all that wanted back to a sprint 15 for lack of crew
i bought 2007 Erling Holmbergs boat , i still have it now, but after moving to Wales not had the time to get my sailing back on track.In 2019 i sailed her at Bala , i also have an A cat now to sail there and move 2007 back to sea sailing at the Mumbles hopefully soon

[Kevin Dutch]

You could say that I was born into it. My Dad John was a member at Seasalter when i was born crewing for a work collegue. Then in 1986 he stopped crewing and brought an old training boat from the west country I think, which was a red striped spark with orange and yellow sails. I got my first boat a topper when i was about 12 but quickly out grew that. The following year my Dad brought new a Techno 1803 so I got to have dads old spark number 640 in 1994. So here I was a 13 year old with no weight wanting to go out in any weather but truthfully being completely overpowered in anything over a force 2
In 2006 I brought 1938 a millenium edition from the old 15 website webmaster Jonathan Perkins from Grafham and have loved it ever since.