A little history about how I became involved with PBGMYS through this website.  Last summer while visiting my Brother Dennis in his new home in South Carolina, he took me out to show me his custom built workshop and there were several RC Sailboats in various stages of assembly.  I had seen several photos on Facebook of a few regattas he had attended, but seeing one up close and personal really caught my interest.  We only had a couple of days there, as we were on a 10,000 mile trip across America in our motorhome for 3 months, so I didn't have the opportunity to do any research about getting into this sport.

    After we returned, and being just recently retired, it occurred to me that I needed something to keep me busy and I called my brother to find out more about RC Sailboats and how I might get into this sport.  He recommended I look for a used Soling 1 Meter and find a local club that races Solings.  He directed me to the AMYA (American Model Yacht Association) and they publish a directory of clubs in each state.  Well, lucky for me, the Palm Beach Gardens Model Yacht Squadron was on the list including a link to their website.  The pond where they race was just a couple of miles from where I live.  The website had a lot of good information and a schedule of their races every Sunday.

    That next Sunday I went by the Lake Catherine Park to get acquainted with some of the sailors there, and things were just getting started.  Right away, one of the members offered his radio and asked if I wanted to give it a try.  I was reluctant and didn't want to screw anything up, but told him I was interested in joining their club and looking to buy a Soling.  The first series of races were Soling 1 Meter boats and I knew right away I wanted one.

    Word was passed around that I wanted to buy a Soling and join the club, and one of the members contacted me that he had a used one for sale.  My brother encouraged me to get into racing right away, so I decided to enter my first race, and ended up dead last.  After I got over the jitters and all the tensions of the starts, I did a little better each race and my confidence grew each week.  Everyone was very friendly and helpful, giving me a lot of sailing tips and how to tune my boat, and I was hooked.

    On the second Sunday I raced, the Commodore was there and I paid my membership dues to join the club.  We had a little conversation about their organization and who's who and who did what, so I asked him about the website and who was looking after it and I volunteered to help out if they needed someone to maintain the website contents.  It wasn't long before the club designated me Webmaster, and here I am writing on a new Blog Page about our club.

    After getting better acquainted with the guy who's been maintaining this site, I got a little history about the website and was given a few suggestions for improvement, including some ideas I thought might help our members communicate better, and after a lot of testing and research for some of the tools needed to improve our website, we decided to keep our website with the current Weebly.com hosting service.  The most important feature needed was to be able to keep certain personal information private for members only.  After discussions with the Commodore and Treasurer, we decided to subscribe to an upgrade that allows members to login with a user name and password to gain access to certain private pages containing addresses, phone numbers, etc, that will be secure.

    I'm sure a lot of you have seen some changes to the look and feel of our website, and since we upgraded our subscription to Weebly.com, we now have a personalized website address that doesn't need the Weebly.com name in it anymore.  You can now get to the home page at the following internet address:

http://www.pbgmys94.com

​You will also see some changes in the Menu that runs across the top of the page, including a LOG IN option for our members.  All Paid Members have access to this function by logging in with their email address and password of their choice.  This will give you access to those pages that are restricted to members only.

A few other improvements were made to the Menu items, including a separate page for each Class's Race Results where the scoring will be posted after each Sunday.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me by email at:

brenthg@yahoo.com

I'll be glad to help.  Your suggestions are always welcome.

Our club held a superb regatta this past weekend. The Valentine’s Regatta weekend started Friday night with a party at Chester and Libby’s. Guitar picking and singing by Rich Mojica joined by Jon playing his mandolin was a treat. Lots of snacks, food and drink and good conversation.


  Saturday morning the wind was SE and a two and a half lap course was set. Nineteen EC-12 skippers divided into two fleets sailing in the Progression-Relegation fleet management system made for 11 or 12 of the big boats on the starting line. At the end of Saturday’s races Earnan was in first place. However on Sunday the perennial front runner Alan Perkins prevailed. You can check out the results at: http://ec12.org/disc/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=2089


A big THANK YOU to Race Director Chester, Chief Scorekeeper John Biles, Jon the Chief No Bull Chili maker, Ann Gelina for the banana bread and caramel chocolate gooey goodies, and all who helped make the Valentines Regatta such a fun event, especially the ladies who made sure we did not go hungry. The heart shaped bamboo cutting board trophies made by Jon were a big hit.


The South Florida Model Sailing Club is hosting a regatta for the Dragons; dragon force 65 on Sat and Dragon Flite 95 on Sunday Feb 18, next Sunday. I am planning to sail in the DF95 event on Sunday to see what it is all about with this fast growing class. In less than two years the class has grown to be third largest in the AMYA.  The largest class, Soling 1M have720 boats registered to AMYA members, EC-12 has 352, and Dragon Flite has 344. If you are interested in going with me to race or watch let me know.


The ALL FLORIDA one day regatta for soling 1M is to be held in Sebring on March 24,2018. Member clubs send two skippers to compete for the best Club and individual trophies.  PBGMYS pays the $70 entry fee for our two skippers.  The NOR is attached. I have been a couple times and it is a fun day sailing from an island in the pond with skippers from around the state. If you would like to represent PBGMYS at this event let me know.


George
George Balaschak, Commodore PBGMYS
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