Andrew Craig is based at Queen Mary Sailing Club, home of the Bloody Mary Pursuit. Andrew started sailing in Wayfarers and racing in Lasers. He joined Queen Mary as a windsurfer before returning to dinghies eventually owning an International 14. Andrew now spends most of his sailing time helping newcomers to the sport develop their skills. His interest in setting handicaps arose from a talk given at the Dinghy Show by the RYA. He takes every opportunity he can to try out new boats and at the latest count has sailed or raced in over 50 different classes.
Bob Carter is based at Grafham Water Sailing Club, home of the Grafham Grand Prix. Bob is the Grafham Handicap Co-ordinator. His sailing experience includes racing Lasers, Enterprises, Graduates and Sprint 15s (ex National Champion). Bob was Grafham catamaran fleet captain for 17 years and has been Sprint 15 Association Committee member for the last 30 years.
David Wilkins is based at Rutland Sailing Club, home of the Tiger Trophy. His interest in sailing handicaps arose from seeing the top 20 places in major handicap events like the Tiger Trophy being won by a small number of classes and other classes not competing because there was no chance of them getting into the top places. David's sailing highlights include winning an Olympic silver medal in a Flying Dutchman and twice being UK National 2-boat team racing champion. He was a race officer at the 2012 Olympics in Weymouth, and hosted the ISAF Team Racing World Championships at Rutland in 2015. In 2019 he was appointed a World Sailing International Race Officer. David has held all club flag officer roles at RSC including leading the team that established Rutland Sailing Club as a National Sailing Academy in 2002, winning lottery grant money in support of upgrading facilities at the club.
Richard Botting has been a member of Draycote Water Sailing Club, home of the Draycote Dash, since 2008. Richard is in his second period of being a Committee member of Draycote having been Rear Commodore Sailing and is currently Vice Commodore. While Richard fleet races in his Fireball, he also owns a Blaze and enjoys handicap racing both at Draycote and other events. He has competed in the SailJuice Winter Series a number of times. Richard is particularly interested in increasing the participation at all levels of sailing and sees the fairest possible handicap racing as a key part of this.
Keith Escritt is based at Yorkshire Dales Sailing Club, home of the Brass Monkey, where he is currently Sailing Secretary. Keith's sailing highlights include winning the Div1 Windsurfing World Championship, podium finishes at Fireball Europeans and Laser Nationals, race wins at the Laser Worlds and Multi Champion in the Vortex. Most of Keith's sailing is now in an RS200. He has a strong interest in fair handicapping and he's also recently passed the regional rules judge examinations.
Photo: Paul Hargreaves