Star Class Honoring the Past, Leading the Future
The U30 Development committee (implemented for members in the Age Groups “Youth” and “Junior” as per Star Class Rule 9.1.6, subsumed as U30 = under the age of 30 years), at the behest of the Star Class IGC, has had some success in executing its mission of identifying young (under 30) Star teams with a serious interest in joining our Class and competing at an international level. The short-term objective the U30 Development committee as sub-committee of the IGC set for themselves was to bring ten U30 teams to the Star Worlds 2022 in Marblehead and the 2022 Western Hemispheres in Lake Sunapee. The U30 Development committee has identified at least five European teams interested and are developing five North American teams to match them. A secondary goal is that the U30 teams attend our championships with the only cost to them being transportation. Class management has agreed to waive or reduce their entry fees and has committed to provide them with housing at no charge.
Now comes the hard part. If the U30 Development committee is to complete its task, it needs boats. More specifically, ten competitive, race-ready boats delivered to these venues for free. The vision and the request is that the membership step-up and facilitate this. There are members who own more than one boat, members who are retired and can transport boats. Some members could provide with spare masts and sails and some members might want to attend these regattas in a social capacity and might be willing to sit out and let a U30 team sail their boat. The Class needs all these things and needs them times ten. This means supplying teams with a boat, getting the boat to the regattas, and ensuring that it is ready to compete. This is a personal request to those of our members who are able to develop a personal sponsorship with a U30 team. It is expected that our membership will not only come through with the material needed to make this work but will also take a personal interest in the success of the teams and, most importantly, to bring them into the best traditions of sportsmanship and good behavior that make our Class unique and attractive.
Our Class has evolved over the last several years and the Star Class needs to actively reach to new sailors. The vision of the U30 Development committee is to identify, contact and vet young sailors who the Class will need, if it is to have a future. But the U30 Development committee has zero funds, and as such its only resource is the membership. Therefore, this appeal directly to the membership to supply, as individual Star Class members, the resources needed to get these young teams to the starting line.
Share our love of the Star LOG, our logo-ed blazers, our Bacardi Cup, our Roster of World Champions, and even our boats, with the next generation of sailors. Let it be a gift from us to share with the next generation of sailors, for them to enjoy, cherish, and take care of for the generation that follows them.
The future of youth and junior members is now entirely in your hands. All we as a Class have are our beloved boats and each other. It is therefore up to us, the membership of the Star Class, on an individual basis to make it grow. The U30 Development committee has taken on the task of finding the people. It now relies on you to provide them with the means.
To participate in this project or find out more please reach out to u30commitee@starclass.org or any of the undersigned directly.
approved by IGC Chair Alberto Zanetti
Arnd Glund
Ben Sternberg
Michael Mueller
Mariano Cambon
