First Olympic Training Event at TISC

This week, the first Olympic-related event is being held at Treasure Island Sailing Center’s newly envisioned high-performance training facility. About 35 sailors in Lasers, Laser Radials, and kites — as well as the 49er FX class — are participating in a weeklong Olympic Development Singlehanded Training Camp from June 3 to 9. This is the first clinic to be held at what will eventually become the Facility for Advanced Sailing and Technology, or FAST USA.

Adult competitors include Paige Railey and Erika Reineke, as well as Charlie Buckingham and Chris Barnard, who are participating alongside younger up-and-coming sailors, which was part of the vision for the FAST center. "FAST will take the kids from the advanced intermediate level and up," said Peter Stoneberg, chairman of the FAST committee, in a ‘Lectronic we ran in April. FAST was the brainchild of TISC founder Carisa Harris-Adamson — nearly 20 years ago, she envisioned a place where kids could launch, rig, and train next to Olympians.

There are top coaches at this week’s clinic. Steve Mitchell, coach for Erika and Paige, said to the kids in attendance, "Do you think Usain Bolt is nervous when he lines up to race? Of course. Everybody is nervous. You have to expect that feeling and not let it affect what you do."

Briefings are being held at TISC in the same room where local fourth graders learn about the Golden Gate wind funnel and other sailing-related tidbits. Another one of Carisa’s goals was to make sure the new FAST facility did not conflict with TISC’s ongoing mission of "providing access, facilities, STEM education and life skills development to people of all socioeconomic backgrounds, skill levels and physical abilities."

At the clinic, Erika talked about the psychological factors involved in competition. "My silver at my Youth Worlds should have been a gold, but I was so caught up in trying to win that I got black-flagged, and there went the gold," she said. Coach Mitchell counseled: "You have to focus on the process, not the outcome."

Carisa said that construction of the new FAST facility should be finished by the fall, and, as evidenced by this week’s training camp, will not interfere with any sailing activities.

Special thanks to Kimball Livingston, who reported this story for us.