A HUGE THANK YOU to our bingo and fund raising volunteers this past year! Jim Adams, Peter Brown, Rick Williamson and Ron Brown (both all the way from Portage La Prairie!). Our club should be able to land another bingo this year to continue adding Optimists to our growing kid's sailing fleet. Over the past few years we've also had huge support from many families at West Hawk and surrounding lakes in the way of donations of sail boats and the lodging of our Sailing Manitoba coaches when they come from the city to help us run our Learn to Sail classes.  A huge thank you to these families! Marty Halprin - for allowing us the use of his beach & dock to run most of our programs! Evelyn & Steve Seniuk - loaning us their Enterprise for the Adult LTS Pam Davis - loaning us her Kolibri for the Adult LTS Paul & Sue Cunningham - bunking & feeding our MSA coaches Bob & Nancy Hayden - bunking & feeding our MSA coaches Once again we had cool wet weather this past summer and there were few weeks of continuous hot sun but the cool weather did provide for an excellent season for sailing.  It seemed like almost every day provided for some wind to throw up the sails and hit the lake. 2009 was the 4th full summer since the West Hawk Lake Yacht Club was resurrected and because of the hard work of the club’s volunteers the sailing activity on West Hawk was again incredible this year.  The number of boats out sailing this year reflected this; Optimists, Albacores, Cadet, Enterprise, Lasers, Laser II, Fireballs, Y-Flyer, Tumbleweed, Code 40, Kolibri, Lazy E, Osprey, & an assortment of Hobie’s and wind surfers. For the 4th straight year the Mobile Optimist Sailing School came to West Hawk Lake and Jocelyn McLaren (her 1st year) and Tyler Green (4th year) provided excellent fun coaching.  We ran a full beginners kids class in the morning, a full adult class in the afternoon and an all day advanced class for the older kids.  We also ran 2 extra weekend classes for the adults (instructor Tim Pressey's 2nd year), for a grand total of 31 people who took their sailing lessons through the WHLYC!    Participation numbers are up for the 4th straight year and plans for 2010 are already underway with weekday AND weekend classes being offered in July 2010.  New for 2010 the club is having a sailing weekend get together with our neighbours at the Falcon Yacht Club Aug.7/10, check the website for details.  The events will be held at FYC so those that need help trailering their boat over there please call Tom Saunders or Paul Krestanowich. As well, for the 1st time in over 25 years the WHLYC will be having their own club races on Aug.15/10 so get your boats ready there is some hardware to be won! Finally, the club is always on the lookout to add a few more boats for the kids sailing program so please call Paul Krestanowich at 774-0967 or 349-2072 if you would like to donate to the program.  Please check out the rest of the website for 2010’s events, scheduled sailing classes, races, pictures, etc.   Here's to a fun sailing summer in 2010!