An oncoming storm forced Janet Acker, executive director of Portland-based SailMaine, to announce the race would be cancelled. A disappointment, to be sure, for the scores of kids who’d already lugged their boats to the water, strapped on their life preservers, and started milling about Bug Light Park in South Portland, hungrily eyeballing the low, slate-gray waves.

But the New England Junior Olympics Regatta – SailMaine’s first event to launch from Bug Light, visible across Casco Bay from the organization’s headquarters – ran for two days, July 15-16, and Day One had gone off without a hitch. So the crowd of aspiring sailors didn’t walk away entirely thwarted.

“We have kids here anywhere from 8-17, and they come from all over New England,” Acker explained, while waiting for the fatal weather report. Then, with the help of nearby Gerry Tiernan, SailMaine program director (and Portland High School coach), she listed a number of Maine locales whence teams had arrived: Peak’s Island, Kittery, Bar Harbor, Boothbay, Freeport, Falmouth, Yarmouth, Kennebunk, Portland and South Portland.

“U.S. Sailing is the national body for youth sailing and racing,” she added. SailMaine and the regular regattas it hosts operate under U.S. Sailing’s umbrella. There were four classes of boats at mid-July’s competition: 420s (two kids and two sails), Lasers (one kid, one sail), and two varieties of Optis (also one kid, one sail).

Tiernan elaborated: “The Junior Olympics is sponsored by…the U.S. Olympic Committee. It’s a series of regional events that promotes athletics – in this case sailing. They draw thousands of kids all over the country to tons of events. I think there’s 80-some-odd sailing events this year, 14,000 kids or something going through the program. They’re a lot of fun.”

The Harraseeket team, based in Freeport, were certainly quick to second that last part, the part about fun. “[I love] the teamship of it,” said Carolina Jimenez. “And racing is really fun.”

Carly Siemen concurred. “I like how we all get along, and how fun it is. Being a crew, trapping – I just like everything about it,” she said.

The Freeport team came to sailing in a variety of ways, some of them unexpected. “My mom just signed me up for it, a long time ago,” said Griffin Primeau. “And then I started loving it, so I kept doing it.”

Many of these young seafarers have been taking to the waves for what seems, to them, like a lengthy span. “I’ve been sailing since I was about 8 years old,” said Emmett Smith, now 15. “So it’s been a long time. It’s been really enjoyable the whole time.”

The team’s race director, Finn Hadlock, sees the sport instilling important values in the cohort. “It builds their teamwork. They learn how to work with each other. They learn how to work in adverse conditions,” he said.

Sailing may not normally be thought of as a high school sport, but both Acker and Tiernan were delighted to report that it’s getting bigger.

“It’s starting to get a lot more recognition,” Tiernan said. “In part due to community sailing centers like SailMaine, where they’ve got the ability to host a number of teams. We host eight high school teams each season, spring and fall, at SailMaine, (including) Portland, Falmouth, Yarmouth, Cape Elizabeth, North Yarmouth.”

“And that’s just us. There’s another community sailing center in Rockland, and one in Mount Desert Island, and one in Boothbay.”

Acker noted that sailing, for the aforementioned secondary squads, is considered a varsity sport.

SailMaine is a nonprofit organization that, according to its website (www.sailmaine.org), offers programs in several areas: adult sailing, high school sailing, junior sailing, and special-needs sailing. The group maintains its own fleet and rents sailboats during the summer.

Casco Bay teems with teens and sails when SailMaine runs its regattas.The Harraseeket team, from Freeport, retired before an approaching storm on Wednesday, July 16, could interfere with their race.

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