<DIV style="font-family:Arial,sans-serif;"><DIV><BR>At least as an initial support of this, I'm planning on coming to Lake Geneva if things go well with the boat restoration, but especially the Mid-winters in St. Petersburg FL as well as the N/A's in Marblehead next summer.</DIV>
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<DIV>So, Bert, if you need an 'able body' for St. Pete, let me know. I think we've already got a crew for Marblehead assembled. For at least the St. Pete regatta, I'm looking to charter a boat from the club. For Marblehead, we may be hauling Marty's boat out there.</DIV>
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<DIV>Now that I'm done with active LOWISA planning, I'm planning on swinging my attention to some serious Sonar competition for next year.</DIV>
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<DIV>Tom</DIV>
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<DIV><BR>--- Bert@apexq.com wrote:<BR><BR>From: Bert Foster <Bert@apexq.com><BR>To: jsligh@earthlink.net,"Sonar Fleet 5" <sonar@lists.wyc.org><BR>Subject: Re: [Sonar] Lake Geneva Great Lakes Championship<BR>Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2006 16:19:21 -0500<BR><BR>Hi All,<BR>I just got back from the Paralympic Regatta in Newport RI. It was my introduction to Paralympic Sailing and what an eye opener. I learned a great deal about Paralympic Sailing and think that with the right team and funding I may be able to win the Paralympic Trials in Oct 2007 and go to China in 2008. However, that would require a $100,000 budget for going to 14 national regattas (some Paralympic and some Able-body) over the next 13 months, plus training time with the team and coaches all year long. That's a lot of travel and its associated cost.<BR><BR>While I am trying to put together my Paralympic program we will go to the Lake Geneva Great Lakes Championship, leave the boat in Lake Geneva and pick it up on Oct 6th to go back out to Newport for the Paralympic Pretrial s Oct 11th thru the 15th.<BR><BR>I found out I can NOT crew a Paralympic Sonar because I'm not strong enough to trim the main in strong wind with one arm. However, I did get "Classified" by the international doctor as a "4", and that is great. "1" is a high Quad, 7 is a single below knee amputee, a low para is a 3. Maximum of 14 points on a boat of 3 people and only 2 on the rail. So, with me being 4, I can have a 3 Para on a bench in front doing the jib and a 7 in the middle doing the main. No spinnakers are used. We do use wisker poles that launch automatically from the cockpit.<BR><BR>I'm fortunate that I was able to hook up with 2 para #3s who have done a total of 4 Paralympic campaigns and want to do bow for me. I have 1 #7 who has done 2 campaigns and wants to do middle, and a second who may be interested and one #4 who could do either. So, its now time to put the resources together to activate the campaign.<BR><BR>See you Thursday,<BR>Bert<BR><BR><BR>At 10:51 AM 8/22/2006, John Sligh wrote:<BR><BR></DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE>Hello Fellow Sonar Sailors,<BR> <BR>The Great Lakes Championship Regatta is in Lake Geneva again this year September 30 & October 1. Allow 1-2 days before for traveling down to Lake Geneva. If you've never been it's a good time. Gusto is going for sure and it would be great to get 3-4 more boats to make the trip.<BR> <BR>If you're interested in going please let me know. If your regular crew can't go don't let that stop you. I'm sure we can put some teams together. <BR> <BR> <BR>John Sligh<BR><A>jsligh@earthlink.net</A><BR> <BR> <BR><BR>_______________________________________________<BR>Sonar mailing list<BR>Sonar@lists.wyc.org<BR><A href="http://lists.wyc.org/mailman/listinfo/sonar">http://lists.wyc.org/mailman/listinfo/sonar</A></BLOCKQUOTE>_______________________________________________<BR>Sonar mailing list<BR>Sonar@lists.wyc.org<BR>http://lists.wyc.org/mailman/listinfo/sonar<BR> <BR><HR>Netscape. Just the Net You Need.</DIV>