Hot news!
We’ve got a sponsor! – Noble Marine insurance has agreed to sponsor the Class Association for 2008 season. Whoop! We have come a very long way since the disruption in 2007 and I view this as a solid endorsement from the trade for the Class, the membership and the direction taken by the present committee. We have a great future ahead - the Streaker is a seriously good dinghy, we have a seriously good Association and we are absolutely being taken seriously.
How exactly does the membership benefit? Well, Nobles have given us a significant sum of money and we now have a discounted insurance scheme for Association members. For all renewals and new insurance policies members need to use the Noble Marine link from our website. This will take them to the Streaker discounted policy application. The rest as they say is not quite plain sailing because you will find that a membership number is requested. At present the Association does not issue membership numbers however, you can use a unique code number obtainable from the membership secretary – Contact Nick Lovell. So, by taking advantage of the scheme nearly 45% of your membership fee is reclaimed
The sum of money given to the class comes with the provision that we must use it to promote the class. No shortage of ideas here – what we will definitely be doing with it is to make sure that we have a damn fine Nationals at Rutland 2008, and that we will have a bigger better stand at the Dinghy Show 2009.
What do we have to do for Noble Marine Insurance? We have agreed to make them our title sponsor for the Nationals 2008 and to ensure that the weblink to the discounted insurance scheme is easily accessible to all members.
Watch this space for more news about the nationals but make sure that you have 29,30 & 31 marked in your diaries.
It'll be Alright on the Night
It all came together at this year’s Dinghy show where all of the publicity, the Henri Lloyd competition, new Rooster deck mould and the Woman’s hour ensured that there was a never ending supply of visitors to the stand. With 2 fabulous boats to show off what the Streaker has to offer there was never a quiet moment. This is the first show that I have been involved with but I got the real sense that visitors felt that they had found the boat that they had been looking for. With an impressive 26 visitors keen to have a test sail things are looking rosy for the class.
The occasion gave us the opportunity to make inroads into rebuilding the class database by meeting existing members, renewing memberships and enrolling some new members too. Nick and Ian worked tirelessly all weekend with laptop and printer whirring when not dealing with enquiries about Streakers. Large quantities of Alan’s excellent reworked year book accompanying the renewals too.
The Name a Streaker competition attracted 117 entries (all clean) and very creative too. Unfortunately when I accosted Ben Ainslie with an entry form and the quip that he would look nice in some Henri Lloyd gear he had a sense of humour failure but did say “Nice try”. Shame really because that would have been a good name had he given me the opportunity to tell him about the competition. With that attitude that guy will never win anything.
The winning name was won by James Brotherston who came up with “The Golden Behind” He will now be suitably equipped with some quality Henri Lloyd kit. Unfortunately not a Streaker sailor………..yet..............
This article can be download in full here.
