A Battle of the Youth Boats

Seahorse may be the dominant international magazine for anyone serious about their racing, but we typically aren’t huge fans of their Sailor of the Month contests. They tend to match up two people with little in common and open up the poll booth to see who has the most friends.

However, the October test did get out attention when they put American Stephen Baker, who has been crushing the Optimist planet, up against kiwi Mathias Coutts who recently won the O’pen BIC Worlds (and has a famous dad). Two kids of similar age sailing vastly different youth trainers.

It came down to just two extra votes for Baker, and while both these kids are winners, we saw that as a pretty good showing for the new age platform versus the highly established pram. Here were some of the voter comments for the winner:

“Stephen is humble, focused and a great role model for other kids.” – Tom Homberger;
“A little guy but a great guy… and a great sailor!” – Fernanda San Roman;
“Calm and confidence, awesome.” – Christina Nigro;
“Great attitude too.” – Claudia Visnevski;
“Stephen has crushed this year in the Opti and he’ll only improve!” – Rob Simmons;
“Stephen is an amazingly talented sailor and he’s still improving so fast…” – Laura Tanton.

The next monthly contest returns to ‘blueberries versus watermelons’ as it pits the J/80 World Champion against the 52 Super Series winner. Here we go again… click here.