Eager to solidify It’s position as being amongst Australia’s premier tertiary institutions the University of Western Australia is embarking upon a new International Sailing program with the purchase in 2009 of a Foundation 36 “UWA Centennial”.

Foundation 36 yachts are a regular feature of sailing on the Swan River be it privateer racing, match racing or corporate chartering. The WA Yachting Foundation presently owns 10 F.36’s. Skip Lissiman of the WAYF says that the F.36 has become such a great yacht for the Swan River due to it’s versatility, performance and open cockpit decks that make for great day cruising or racing, “if you can’t clean it with a fire hose then there’s too much crap on it”.

Remy Donraadt who is in charge of developing UWA’s sailing ambitions says that the introducing sailing complements many of the Universities sporting, educational and promotional objectives. UWA, already utilising UWA Centennial to entertain University staff on twilights, wants to offer sailing as an activity for Alumni and Corporate customers of the University Club. The UWA Business School also has ambitions to incorporate sailing within its MBA program for teamwork development.+

In September Perth will host the Australian University Games where sailing will debut as an exhibition sport. While details of the format to be adopted are yet to be finalised Remy wants to incorporate Match, Fleet and Teams racing into the program with racing not necessarily being limiting to the F.36 class but Bakewell White 8’s and Puffin Pacer dinghies also.

UWA expects in the coming years to increase it’s fleet to include an additional Foundation 36, Bakewell White 8’s and dinghies. When asked how they would finance this expansion Remy replied that while boats should sustain themselves through chartering partnerships between UWA and Business would be welcomed.