George Stevens Academy and Maine Maritime Academy (MMA) hosted the Down East Regatta May 11-12 in Castine. The regatta serves as the Maine High School Sailing Championships. This two-day regatta affords New England’s best scholastic sailors to experience MMA’s unique campus and waterfront.

As an open regatta, both New England Scholastic Sailing Association (NESSA) and non-NESSA teams compete for the overall trophy. This year, the Down East Regatta coincided with the High School National Championship in Seattle and the New England Women’s Championship at Bowdoin College. NESSA powerhouses, Belmont Hill and Marblehead High School sent top teams. Perennially strong Mount Desert Isle, Falmouth, Isleboro, and Portland were expected to vie for the trophy for top Maine High School.

The Down East is a fleet race in which A and B divisions alternate racing. The team with the combined lowest points wins. Non-NESSA teams draw sailors from different schools in their small communities and may even draw from middle schools to make a team. Southern Maine (SoME), Rockland Community Sailing (RCS), and Boothbay Region Sailing Club (BRSC) field these type of conglomerate teams with typically 5-10 sailors. For the second year in a row only high school sailors were eligible.

While Boothbay did not send a squad this year, former Boothbay sailors, Ella Beauregard of Southport and Alton Coolidge of Round Pound, sailed for Rockland Community Sailing (RCS). In blustery conditions and sunny skies on the first day winds topped at just over 20 knots. Beauregard and Coolidge struggled at times to gain clear air after the start but managed respectable finishes throughout with no score worse than 10th and a best race 2nd place. After nine races over two days, they tied with Portsmouth on points for a 7th place in A Division. The Rockland team’s B boat sailed in their first major regatta to finish 12th. Overall the RCS team finished in 9th place out of 19 teams. Belmont Hill won both divisions and overall, Marblehead took second overall, and Isleboro took third overall winning the Maine State Championship.

This was the first regatta Beauregard and Coolidge sailed together. Last season sailing for Boothbay each had different roles. Beauregard is regarded as the best C420 crew among Maine youth sailors while Coolidge is a promising Laser sailor. For the state championships last weekend they reversed roles with Beauregard skippering and Coolidge crewing. Both are accomplished athletes outside of sailing with Coolidge playing hockey and lacrosse while Beauregard swims competitively for Lincoln Academy. They are working with their parents and faculty to develop a Lincoln Academy Sailing team for Fall 2019.

Last summer, Beauregard sailing for Boothbay Harbor Yacht Club with Hamilton Barclay, qualified for the US Sailing Double-Handed Junior National Championships. They took 2nd place in that National Championship a few weeks later in LaSalle, Michigan on Lake Erie. As the first team from Boothbay to compete in US Sailing junior championships since 1991, they were also the youngest pair to place in the top 3 in event history. Barclay expects to attend Lincoln Academy in the Fall.

In April Beauregard and Barclay skippered boats for Rockland’s RCS to win the first Pen Bay regatta of the season at Boothbay.

Last month Beauregard and Barclay were accepted into the Brooke Gonzalez Clinic in mid-June at SailNewport. The Brooke Clinic is the premier youth sailing clinic in the country with more than 20 college and Olympic Development coaches working with athletes over 4 days on fitness, diet, tuning, speed, tactics, and campaigns. Less than 50% of applicants are accepted. Earlier this month, the pair was invited based on the strength of their resume, to compete in US Sailing’s Youth Championship event in Little Egg Harbor, New Jersey June 21-25 in the I420 class.