90 youths participate in Oman Sail Ranking Race event
The recent Ranking Race event featuring young Omani sailors has been hailed as a significant step forward on the path to developing racing talent and skills.
An intense two days of racing saw 90 youthful sailors put through their paces at Mussanah Sailing School as part of a process to test and assess their progress and potential.
The sailors, aged from 10 to 17 years old and part of the Omantel-supported Youth Programme, came from all four of the Oman Sail sailing schools – Mussanah, Sur, Marina Bandar al Rowdha and Al Mouj, Muscat, and raced in Optimist, Laser 4.7 and Techno windsurfing classes.
The Ranking Race event, Oman Sail’s third of 2017, had added importance as it included the team which will represent the sultanate at the International Optimist Dinghy Association 2017 Asian and Oceanian Championship, which starts in Hong Kong at the end of the month.
“During the Ranking Race event, I noticed an improvement in the performance of our new sailors who recently joined the school,” said Ali al Shuhaimi, centre manager of Al Mouj Muscat Sailing School.
“Successful events like these are important as I would not be able to see their improvement without testing them in these kind of races,” he added.
In particular, Shuhaimi highlighted the improved perform- ance of Osama al Zadjali, who won the Optimist Under-12 title, Hassan al Owisi and, among the girls, Aya al Habsi, Malak al Rawahi and Shumooa al Rawahi, who was the leading girl in the Optimist class.
Mussanah Sailing School Centre manager Mohammed al Balushi also praised the skills of his young sailors, while celebrating the fact that they collectively helped win the best Sailing School award overall.
“The Ranking Race is an important event for us as it tracks the performance of the sailors and it helps them to be more confident about themselves,” he said.
“The event is also a good platform to prepare the sailors for the upcoming regattas.”
It certainly provided the ideal launch pad for the team heading for the IODA championship in Hong Kong, with three of them – Al Moatasem al Farsi, Alla al Omrani and Mohammed al Qasmi – taking the top three places respectively in the 45strong Optimist fleet.
They, along with Mohammed al Alawi and Samiha al Riyami, will be racing against 127 other sailors from a range of countries including China, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, Thailand and the United States when racing starts on September 29.
In the Optimist under-12 category Elyas al Fadhli and Hashim al Auraimi were second and third behind Osama al Zadjali.
The 18-strong Laser 4.7 class was won by Abdulmalik al Hinai from Al Mouj, Muscat Sailing School, ahead of Zakriya al Wahabi (Mussandam) and Hussain al Mansoori (Marina Bandar al Rowdha).
Meanwhile, in the Techno windsurfing class Abdulwahab al Mujaini won the under-15 title, with Mohammed Nabil al Balushi taking the under-17 category.
The Open Techno classification was won by Al Makhtar al Mujaini, with Abdullah al Rahbi second and Abdulmajed al Hadrami taking the third spot on the podium.