Bermudian Sebastian Kempe took top overall honours as well as first-place in the Under-13 section in the O’Pen BIC National Championship Regatta over the weekend.

The two-day event, hosted on Hamilton Harbour by the Royal Hamilton Amateur Dinghy Club, saw 38 Bermudian sailors, 17 of whom represented the America’s Cup Endeavour Programme, compete for prizes in the Under-13, Open and Girls Divisions.

The young Kempe, sailing out of the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club, had the low score of 22 points in 13 races sailed over the two days.

Coming in second overall and first in the Open Division was RHADC sailor Aiden Lopes with 24 points. Third overall and second in Open was Ahzai Smith, from RBYC, with 28 points. Fourth place went to Rian Geraghty-McDonnell, of RHADC, with 32 points, Every sailor got three “throw-out” races to drop their worst scores from the regatta.

Gabrielle Brackstone, from RHADC, was the leading girl in the regatta. She was tenth overall with 94 points.

In addition to sailing for the O’Pen BIC National Championship all the sailors were also competing to qualify to represent Bermuda in the America’s Cup Endeavour O’Pen BIC Regatta, to be sailed on June 15-16 and during the break of the America’s Cup Match on Saturday, June 17.

Brackstone and Lopes won the right to represent Bermuda’s O’Pen BIC “class” sailors. Kempe will compete as the top national sailor and Genevieve Lau the next overall girl in the weekend regatta. She came 12th. Christopher Raymond came 13th and Jessie DeBraga 28th, as the top two America’s Cup Endeavour Programme boy and girl sailors in the Nationals. They won the two Endeavour slots in the America’s Cup Endeavour O’Pen regatta.

The six Bermudians youths are offered housing and meals and a host of social activities with the 32 international O’Pen BIC sailors coming to the island from eleven nations as sponsor guests. It is a great opportunity for these six local youngsters to rub shoulders with some of the best of young international sailors in the game.

Racecourses for the O’Pen BIC Bermuda National Championship were “Un-Regatta”style with the start just off of Front Street in the harbour and a windward leg to the south shore. Then came a reach to the East and a downwind slalom zigzag around a series of buoys followed by a reach to the west and the “Bridge of Doom”.

The “Bridge of Doom” is a bracket shaped inflatable obstacle that the sailors must sail through and under to reach the finish.

The top tube of the Bridge is not quite high enough for the sailboat’s mast to clear without dipping it as the boat passes under the bridge. The skipper must make his boat heel over to get through.

Hitting the bridge and getting stuck on the back side or heeling too much and capsizing meant doom for more than a few youngsters. Some sailors lost five or six places to the bridge in a given race. But it was a fun course and the sailors took to the challenge. All conquered the “Bridge of Doom” by the final race.

The racing was led by the RHADC race committee and Nevin Sayre, the O’Pen BIC Americas Representative and the class’s Fun Sailing Development co-ordinator. Sayre and America’s Cup CEO Sir Russell Coutts, whose son just got to Bermuda and raced only on Sunday, awarded the prizes.