This Is Guernsey

By Aaron Scoones

SOPHIE PLATTS held her own in the large waves of the North Sea at the Laser Radial Youth World Champion-ships in Scheveningen, the Netherlands. Seventy of the top junior sailors from 26 nations were invited to this year’s event. And the 17-year-old Ladies’ College student was one of five British girls to be chosen.

She is the first Channel Island girl ever to have been selected for this event. The Sarnian had been in a good position until the last day of the competition.

‘It was really good as I only just got the last place [in the team],’ she said.

‘Up until the last day I was relatively happy as I was placed second British sailor and 21st overall. It had been quite windy and it was really good on the Wednesday but then it went really, really light on the last day.

‘It was completely different conditions from the rest of the week. I dropped 10 places.’

Platts moved into the women’s Olympic single-handed class in 2005, having previously held the UK National junior girls champion title in the smaller Laser 4.7 rig. She initially struggled with this more powerful sail, but this year her training and persistence has started to bring results.

Last season she was one of only two girls in the UK to be selected by the Royal Yachting Association for training with the Youth Transitional training programme, and this spring she received another boost when she gained a place in the National Youth Squad. Platts was also part of the Guernsey sailing side that took team silver at the Rhodes Island Games earlier this summer.

Although Platts was delighted to have made the national team selected for Holland, she was not satisfied with her result of 31st out of 70 and fourth British girl. But it was a useful learning curve for her.

‘I went to gain experience and to see what I have to work on over the winter,’ she said.

Straight after the event in Holland, she then had to travel overnight to Wey-mouth to arrive just in time for the start of the UK National championships.

That open event, sailed in windy conditions, attracted over 140 male and female radial sailors.

The races were held in the bay which will be home to the Olympic racing in 2012.

And Platts gave her best performance to date in a national competition.

After an initial qualifying series, the massive fleet was split into gold, silver and bronze fleets for the final medal races.

The Guernsey star was one of only five females to make it into the top fleet of 50 sailors and she ended the week second British youth girl and 41st overall.

‘Really pleased - out of the youth squad I was the second girl and there were only five girls who qualified for the gold league,’ she said.

Platts’s goal now is to retain her place in the national youth squad and to make next year’s Worlds team when the event will be held in Auckland, New Zealand, at Easter.