Island Life Magazine Ltd August/September 2009 | Page 60

life

ON THE WATER

and getting on together in confined spaces,” explains Craig
Burton of ASTO. “The race gives a bit of focus on the fun and
excitement of the competition, but it’s the wider experience of
living on board, working as a team that is the priority.”
He sites his 15-year-old nephew as an example. “He wasn’t
a troubled lad, but he wasn’t focussed. So we sent him to sail
training. A month afterwards, he decided what he wanted to do
for his career – and that he’d have to pull his finger out now to
achieve it.”
While each year applications to the Cowes race and those
to the other Sail Training races that take place all around the
country are received from people who have sailed before, by no
means all participants have a sailing background. Kerry Torr had
a wayward childhood and had run into problems with drugs.
Sail Training was one of the outdoor activities in which she was
directed, and her life, simply, was changed. She eventually got a
job on a Sail Training ship which provides sailing for disaffected
people – just like her. And, were it not for Sail Training, she says
she would be dead by now – “my life was that bad.”
For the most part Sail Training isn’t about the difference
between life and death but about the turn it can affect in
lives. By putting young people on their mettle it draws out

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