Ray Griffin talks to madforsailing

What does the chairman of the RYA Race Training Committee do?
In theory we supervise all race training that the RYA undertakes in the United Kingdom but in practice it's a youth committee. We don't get involved in much adult race training and effectively we are now the volunteer committee running the new youth programme.

Historically the youth programme in Britain has been really strong but there's been a little bit of a lull. I guess you're now trying to really drive it back up to full strength again. Explain to me how you're doing that?
The youth programme as a whole has been greatly enhanced in recent years firstly by Volvo coming in as sponsor for the youth programme and secondly the advent of lottery funding 18 months ago.

What are you doing to put Britain back in the forefront of youth sailing?
We got the new programme funded by a million pounds of lottery money and it's now streamlined to feed directly into the various classes of the Olympic slate. In the last couple of years we've introduced the 29er as the asymmetric feeder for the 49er and the Hobie 16 as the feeder for the Tornado at Olympic level. We are very pleased about the progressive decision to introduce the 29er 18 months ago as the choice has been vindicated. The 29er will be used in the youth worlds next year instead of the 420. The Hobie was a bit more straightforward because that's now an official Youth World Championship class. The French are including it in the championships in July.

How much difference does it make to your programme that the classes for the youth worlds keep chopping and changing with the Byte, the Europe and the Laser Radial together with the 420 and the 29er. Is that a problem for you or is that a good thing?
It's a problem for the rest of the world more than it is for us. Although it was a nuisance the Byte was easily converted to. Historically when the classes have changed we've done well. I think that's probably because of the depth of our talent and training programmes. It seems to be that other countries suffer when these classes are changed. The problem of course is the ISAF systems of organiser supplied boats. It has its advantages and its attractions from ISAF's point of view but it does provide a lot of problems for organising countries.

What is the RYA trying to achieve with the Youth Nationals?
The event is the combined championships and selection trials. The championships speak for themselves. The selection trials are an enormous undertaking. We have the team going to the worlds in France in July and we have squad selection for squads, the national squads in the five competing classes. We also have well over £10,000 worth of travel grants to award. That's one of the innovations that the race training committee have brought in in the last three or four years following the introduction of Volvo sponsorship. Selection used to be done during the week by a small sub-committee but we now have a full time chairman of selectors who works throughout the year with the classes at their qualifiers. When he arrives he and his team arrive at these championships they already have fairly thick files on each of the individuals.

What is the great benefit of being in the squad?
Being a member of the squad provides RYA-funded training so sailors can do well in the various class championships throughout the rest of the year. It also gives training to the youngsters that otherwise wouldn't get any coaching and makes GBR sailing all the stronger.

About 18 months ago when the lottery funding came through there was a lot of talk about broadening the pyramid, widening the base, and all those kind of expressions. Are those schemes going well?
The success is difficult to measure at this stage because it's early on in the cycle. The lottery-funded programme goes on for four years and we are just reaching the end of the first year. I think it's fair to say it has been patchy but it has been successful when we talk in terms of broadening the base - that certainly has taken place. There are or will be a thousand youngsters in zone junior squads next winter up and down the country. Those children will be providing the talent for the future. Some of them will drop out - there's no doubt about that - because it is a pyramid and people drop out at each stage but there is an awful lot more youngsters going to be receiving coaching in the next 12 months than we've ever had before. That's good.

madforsailing has full details of the RYA Youth training scheme.