Mission Statement Vice President Masters' fleet
By Fons van Gent, IFA Vice-President Master's Fleet, President Finn World Masters
Date: Wednesday May 14, 2008
Location: Regatta Center, Medemblik, The Netherlands
When Rolf Lehnert two years ago announced that he would retire from being President of the Masters fleet I was asked by Finn sailors
from several countries to succeed him.
After almost two years thinking and discussing with my wife I decided to take over the job. The fact that I will retire from work on May 1st 2009 has made the decision easier.
Unfortunately there were no other candidates so no voting was necessary, but I was glad to see that all Finn Masters, who were present at the meeting, supported Friedrich Muller who proposed me.
In my first speech I gave the following Mission Statement:
“I thank you all for having faith in me as the new President of the Finn Masters fleet.
I will be there for all Master Finn sailors and will always be at your service and don’t hesitate to contact me when there is anything you want to discuss about the Finn World Masters event.
This year I will become 40 years old for the 21st time. In these 21 years I attended 16 World Masters events, so I know a lot of the Finn Masters, which will make my job easier.
One of the things I will pick up first is bringing more structure in the organization, because I think this is necessary in a growing event like this. In my opinion it is desirable to create continuity by making some regulations which will secure the future of the Finn World Masters.
Communication will from now on be through Internet and e-mail, as the Dutch organization of the 2008 event started it. It appeared to be very comfortable for almost all sailors and the organization of the event.
Further the major language will be English, but whenever someone did really not understand what was said I will translate very short in German or French. Other languages are not my strongest points.
We will have to safeguard the format of the event as we ever agreed it. We must be aware of the growing amount of “youngsters” in the Masters fleet, but we must make sure that it remains joyful for all Masters between 40 and far up. It must remain a good combination of good, sportive sailing, good eating and drinking and a kind of yearly reunion.
There were 42 sailors entered for the event at Medemblik who did not show up without any message. They will receive an invoice from the Dutch committee, because this creates a gap in the finances. A lot of things (i.e. food, memento’s) were ordered on base of the total amount of entries and will be charged by the suppliers also for the sailors who didn’t show up.
I will end with the announcement that within short I will travel to Maubuisson in France to visit the organization committee for the Finn World Masters in 2009.
In 2010 we will sail in Split, Croatia, so we do not have to vote for a location for 2010.
Fons van Gent
President Finn Masters fleet.