Ahoy, young skipper

Contributor Lynn Gray tells us about Amy Minnikin, the youngest skipper in the 2010 Chester Race Week

It was the Saturday before Chester Race Week and Amy Minnikin was ready for the shakedown sail.

In 20-plus knots of breeze, she and her crew aboard Ry’n Sun, a Ranger 30, were having one of their last training runs before the three-day August Regatta when things began to break. More than half of the sliders at the mast snapped, the blocks that the jib halyards ran through seized and a stanchion base let loose.

Regardless of the challenges of that day Amy Minnikin skippered her first big boat across the start line on Day One of Chester Race Week this year with literally no start line practice. Although she was light on crew, her goal was to finish the race at all costs. At one point during the first day’s race more than 200 gallons of water was sloshing through the vessel when the clamp on the exhaust hose let go. The bilge pump literally burned out trying to keep up with the constant onslaught of gushing sea water. She laughs as she recounted the incident and describes how the “bucket brigade” kept bailing and she kept sailing. Two of her crew that day had never been on a keel boat before and although they finished dead last, which most sailors find less than stellar, it was victorious for Amy, the 13-year-old skipper and the crew of the 30-foot boat that had not been out of drydock for almost six years.

The Chester experience came to fruition when Paula, Amy’s mom and number one fan, had been chatting with Mick and mentioned that Amy expressed interest in sailing in Chester Race Week.

“Amy is a talented and gifted sailor who is both focused and fearless,” says Mick Ryan, Ry’n Sun’s owner and a longtime Minnikin family friend.

Mick offered to let Amy and her mom pull the Ranger 30 out of drydock and told her that if they did the work, they were welcome to race the boat during Chester Race Week.

It was June and the race for the race was on. In the evenings Amy and her mom would drive from Halifax to Chester to work on the boat. This was after Amy spent full days on the water as part of the Nova Scotia Yachting Association 420 Development Race Team. She trains with them part time during the school year and full time during the summer. Each day she finished about 4:30 p.m. and they headed from the Royal Nova Scotia Yacht Squadron and drive to Chester to ready the boat for the water. In order to maximize their training time on the Ranger, Amy’s mom often volunteered to tow the 420s to the local weekend regattas so when it was another parent’s turn to tow the 420s to an out-of-town regatta Amy and her mom could spend the travel time working on Ry’n Sun and getting it ready for Chester.

“We had two long extension cords plugged together, so that at least we had light when we were working on it after dark,” she recalls. They would drive home late in the evening so that Amy could be back at the 420 Race Training Site each morning for 8:30 a.m. That cycle continued for almost three months.

They replaced all of the lines and halyards and dismantled the winches that needed to be cleaned and greased. They pulled apart the running and standing rigging that needed to be overhauled. And they even took apart the electronics and managed to get the cassette player to work so that now they at least had some music on board, albeit vintage 80s.

On Day 2 of Chester Race Week, there was no racing, which left them ready and rested for the third day. That day was their best, coming in fourth. Amy had her friend Bucket Fraser as bowman. She said that allowed her to concentrate on making the boat go fast.

“Bucket is so awesome on the foredeck,” she said. “I don’t have to worry about a thing.” Zack and Jane Filbee were the teams tacticians and Amy’s mom usually took care of much of the work forward of the mast.

Sailing is about choices. On Day 4 at Chester, Amy says the crew made the mistake of rounding the leeward mark incorrectly. They chose to go below the Island and the wind died, so they were within 30 seconds of placing 6th or 7th. That’s as close as it got.

What was Amy’s most memorable part of experience?
“The whole regatta was just a really fun time,” she said with a smile.

Although only 13, Amy has advice for other young sailors. She says if there is something on a boat that you are interested in doing – just ask. She said most kids don’t think to ask if they can drive the boat and most owners don’t think to offer the helm to a teen.

While Amy may be fearless, she does recall a time when she was a little scared. She remembers the Newport Bermuda trip she took last year as a present for her 13th birthday. Travelling on a Hinkley South West 43 she admits that it a little bumpy at times with waves of 25 to 30 feet, but it wasn’t that bad..

Mick Ryan said that he and his wife could not be more pleased to see the Ranger 30 being used by this dynamic mother-daughter duo. He says he’s looking forward to watching what level the tenacious young sailor will reach with her sailing talents. He is happy to be able to be an instrumental part of her head start in the sailing world and is thrilled to watch her skills develop at such a young age.
Amy is a contender for the Nova Scotia Provincial Sailing Team for the upcoming 2011 year and plans to spend her Christmas vacation down South with her mom back aboard the Hinkley South West 43.