VENUE PROFILE CENTER STAGE Photo: Peter McGowan


The genesis of the Chicago Match Race Center (CMRC) is found in the sailing trajectory of its founder, Don Wilson. Beginning with dinghies in Switzerland before progressing to college racing, then onto the T10, J105 and the Melges 24, before finally trying his hand at match racing in 2005. It was love at first dial-up and by 2008 Wilson had got Bill Hardesty, a WMRT winning tactician, calling the shots for him on the US circuit, and had competed at the Argo Group Gold Cup in Bermuda.


Photo: Peter McGowan


Wilson takes up the story, “After seeing what was out there, I decided there was an opportunity to create an organization solely focused on match racing. Working with Bill Hardesty, we selected Tom 28 Maxs as our fleet, and Ribcraft as umpire boats. I also designed a 70 foot houseboat as the club house. The city and the park district were great to work with, and managed to set us up with plenty of room at the north end of Belmont Harbor.” The objective was simple; to provide the facilities to raise the level of match racing both locally in the Great Lakes area, and nationally in the United States.


Don Wilson currently sits at 37 on the ISAF Ranking list, so the project was never lacking credibility, but Bill Hardesty’s involvement can’t have hurt. Winner of the World Match Racing Tour as tactician for Britain’s Ian Williams, Hardesty also won the


Etchells Worlds in San Diego in 2011. He’s now relinquished his original role as CMRC’s Sailing Director to return to the 2011 World Match Racing Tour with Ian Williams. Hardesty commented, “We took the best parts of all of the events we had done collectively and put the Center together. We hired really good people and always looked to improve.”


The daily management of the Center is now in the hands of Program Director, Tod Reynolds; while five-time College National Champion (and Reynolds’ some-time match race skipper), Taylor Canfield is the new Sailing Director. Canfield has taken full advantage of the opportunity, mixing coaching and umpiring with training at the Centre and representing CMRC in many events, including the WMRT’s Argo Group Gold Cup. Canfield now has an ISAF ranking of 30 and told us, “It is all because of Don Wilson ... who


MATCH RACING 360° | NOVEMBER 2011


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