We left off chatting with Kate as she was getting into the thick of the 2013 “Big Cat” America’s Cup in San Francisco. (Part 1 of this interview can be found at windcheckmagazine.com/article/women-on-the-water-kate-somers/).
Coop: Ah, typical boat biz, On the job training, eh?
Kate: Yup, crash course central in marketing and communications, especially at that very high level. It was quite an experience. I finished my Master’s out there, in the middle of the AC. I told my adviser in Boston that I had a job offer and was going to San Francisco, found the class I needed to finish the degree out there, and my advisor said go for it. And the Oracle guys let me leave early (5:00 PM) one day a week so I could complete the degree.
When the Cup was over, most of the team, including me, was out of work. I packed my bags and returned to Rhode Island. I had been talking to Brandon, my now husband, who curiously enough owned a Pearson Triton. I had met him because of that boat. Someone had introduced us, and every time I ran into him I’d say, “I am really into guys with Pearson Tritons”…and that obviously worked out with Mr. Brandon Somers.
Not long after I arrived back, I ran into Brad Read [Executive Director at Sail Newport] and he asked if I was going to come back to coaching Rogers (and now Middletown”. I said, “Yeah, I guess so.” When I began coaching again, I started rising T. I wanted to take the skills I learned with the Oracle team and my Master’s and help out organizations like the Newport Bermuda Race, Storm Trysail Club, a lot of the paper clubs I now have as clients. And I kept coaching high school kids. Brandon and I bought an old C&C 34, fixed it up and started cruising. I started racing on other boats like the Swan 42 The Cat Came Back.
Coop: By now you had a pretty deep skill set plus a good Rolodex. Talk about building the business.
Kate: I have been doing more media for more and more events. I worked with Mark Towill, and was helping him and Charlie Enright from the early days with promo pieces for their Volvo campaigns. I ended up doing two campaigns/ worth of contracts for/with them and managing my other clients as well.
I did not travel with the Alvimedica (first) campaign, but after the last campaign, with lots of travel, I thought, “Well, that was great. I’m ready to settle down in Rhode Island and keep working with my clients.
Brandon and I were married, and we had a baby (Connor) a couple years ago. We all go cruising on the C&C. Connor has logged a lot of miles. He’s done the Mitchell Race out to Block Island and cruised up to Maine. Lots of sailing for a toddler. My goal is for him to fall in love with sailing rather than having us pushing him into it, and he does seem to like it.
Coop: I reckon you do need to be careful about push versus pull.
Kate: I just want him to have fun and enjoy the water. Speaking of which, we may be upgrading. We’re looking at an old C&C 41 in a few days. It was abandoned in the 2012 Bermuda Race because the rudder broke. The owner went out to the Yellow Brick position and towed it 400 miles back to Newport. So, we’ll see. Long term goal is to keep cruising and racing on Other Peoples’ Boats.
Coop: Let’s back up a bit. How old were you back in the Typhoon when you would go below to play, and fall asleep?
Kate: Three. I loved just going up on the bow and being up there. Somewhere there is a picture my grandfather took of me sitting on the bow. I did not want my picture taken, of course, and he was in the cockpit calling. “Katherine, Katherine.” I turned around and growled “WHAT?” so the photo he got was me giving him the evil eye.
Coop: Yeah, the grumpy bow girl picture.
Kate: My main memory of those days is being on the bow, and it’s kind of funny: my main, usual role these days is on the bow.
Coop: How old were you when your family went out to Hawai’i?
Kate: From 2nd grade to high school sophomore, but there were two years in Japan in the middle. I was just sailing around originally, and only started learning to race at the Navy base in Japan. I only really got into racing, when I was eleven, in the El Toros back in Hawai’i.
Coop: What was the venue for that?
Kate: There was a little circuit between Waikiki, Kaneohe and Pearl Harbor Yacht Club, with a regatta at each location around the island every weekend. You’d be basically packing the boats onto the trailer every three weekends and driving over to the regatta. And there was an interesting cultural thing in force there. I used to get cranky with the Rogers High School kids back in Rhode Island. In Hawa’ii, kids were not allowed to leave the docks and boat area until all the boats were stowed away (properly). Everyone had to help each other to pack up. It was a great introduction to responsibility and teamwork. There was a swimming pool at the yacht club, but you couldn’t just pack up your boat and walk over to the pool until everyone was squared away. It was just part of the culture of the place. One of the things I was emphatic about in my coaching back here is the same concept. No one leaves the docks – don’t care if it’s raining or snowing or blowing – until the boats are secure and ALL the sails are rolled up. If you’re done, go help your mates. That early lesson in Hawai’i really had an impact on my views of young kids and sailing.
Coop: What was the inspiration for Friday Night Lights [a weekly all schools fleet racing series from the end April to the end of May, now run by Sail Newport and the four schools who sail from there]?
Kate: The idea came about during a NESSA meeting [New England Scholastic Sailing Association, the regional administrative body for high school sailing]. We were all walking around with clipboards and calendars, scheduling team racing matches. I thought, “This is nuts. We spend all this time driving kids around. They are not getting any practice, just competing. Then there’s logistics of getting a bus full of kids organized, then the weather’s not cooperating, and the kids aren’t getting any sailing.
This comes back to my feeling that you need to get kids to enjoy, look forward to and love sailing before you put them in the trenches of competition. I thought, “We are burning these kids out, especially kids new to sailing, by throwing them into racing before they really know how to sail. The boarding schools can sail Wednesdays and Saturdays and go at it hot and heavy; that’s fine. But in Newport, The Sailing Capital of the World, that the two local public high schools could not field complete teams was just wrong. So, we combined Rogers and Middletown as one group. We got push-back from some schools and NESSA. They thought we were going to create a Super Team! I just wanted to get these kids onto 40-degree water and not capsize. I wanted them to have a good, positive experience of sailing first. Then I thought, “Why doesn’t everyone come down to Sail Newport once a week and fleet race, on Fridays?”
But what I did not think about was the social aspects of Friday Night Lights. When we started, FNL was staged from Newport Yacht Club. For the first few events we had cookouts, and the kids would wander into the club’s downstairs area. I was thinking “Oh my God, we cannot let the kids into the club like that.” I spoke to Rudy the Club Steward and he said, “Do NOT under any circumstances kick them out! Just let them be kids.” The sailing morphed into a social event. This is what college sailing is like: you practice all week and compete on the weekends, and it’s a party.
Coop: Great stuff, and FNL is still going.
Kate: Oh, yeah! I can hear you all on Channel 78 when I’m at JBY and I wanna cry.
Coop: The past couple seasons we’ve run A and B fleets together, and since Sail Newport has twenty-four new Zim 420s we can have twelve schools on site, including the four local schools. Parents and friends come down and watch, we have alternative schools organize the cookout, and the kids have a blast. Thanks for a great idea, and the great yarns.
Kate: Thank you, Coop! ■
