Saturday, April 4, 2015

Taarbaek Sailing Club Has New J/80!

J/80 women sailors enjoying afternoon sail off Cyprus (Taarbaek, Denmark)- The Taarbaek Sailing Club in Denmark now has a new J/80 for their adult sailing program. It’s a sweet story about how one of the smallest sailing clubs in Denmark was blessed with an un-traditional source to raise funds to purchase their J/80.  Here’s the story from Torsten Rasmussen from Denmark’s BAADNYT sailing magazine (http://www.baadnyt.dk).

“One of the Sound’s smallest yacht clubs located in Taarbaek is linked to a very small harbor with only 100 moorings.

But, the club, which just had its 75th anniversary, is a very active club with a large junior section with three youths and an adult program with two H-boats. The Club has the stated goal that it should be inexpensive to become a member for both their junior sailing as well as adult sailing programs.  This is achieved with little help from sailing foundations and using mostly the club’s volunteer labor.

It has long been a desire to make the club's adult program more attractive. The club has therefore decided to replace the adult program’s H-boats with new J/80s.  But, the idea was to get one J/80 first, then when there was time and money in the future, to get another J/80 to replace the second H-boat.

And, so why select the J/80?  Simple.  The small yacht club needed a very sturdy boat that was safe, easy to use, fun to sail, could stay in the water all the time.  Plus, there are a number of J/80s at good sailing clubs nearby in Denmark.

Then, the most amazing thing happened, almost as if a gift from God fell out of the sky!  An envelope was dropped into the club’s mailbox one day, sent by the Association for Sail Sports Joy.  The envelope contained a letter that expressed their “congratulations” to the club on deciding to acquire their new boat and included inside the letter was a check for a large sum of money to help them buy the new J/80! The Board of Taarbaek SC has carefully considered and guessed, but who is the Association for Sail Sports joy?

The club will certainly “thank” the Association for the donation and together with the Kai Nielsen Houmann Fund, it has made it possible to buy the new J/80 for the adult program.  The world is wonderful and the club is convinced that the purchase is the right decision for their older adults in the Taarbæk Sailing Club.  Please note— Taarbaek has begun the hunt for the J/80 #2 soon!  Read it all in Danish here.