In honour of HSC exams staring next week, today we’re featuring another of our youth radial sailors. Year 12 student and Olympic hopeful, Sylvie Stannage.
1. How old were you when you first stepped on a boat?
I think I started Tackers in the summer of 2013, so I was probably 10 years old. I really hated sailing for a couple of years and only really got into it when I was about 13.
2. If money (& sailing ability) were no limit, what boat would you buy?
I’m pretty sure they’re not in production anymore, but the Flying Phantom for sure – it’s an insane foiling catamaran that I would love to get my hands on one day.
3. What is your sailing goal?
My goal is to go to the Olympics one day, or otherwise as long as the fabulous Brett Beyer can put up with coaching me.
4. Tell us the back story to your laser's name?
This is an interesting one – my boat is called Little Miss Persist, and it comes from my first training session ever in a Laser. I was at HHSC, and we were sailing around Cockatoo Island when the wind completely died. I hate being towed, so I pumped all the way in, which took hours but earnt me my boat name. Some people might have seen on my DBSC Women’s Regatta entry, my dad put my boat name down as An Essay on Existentialism. I’m in year 12 and my English Extension 2 major work, which completely consumed my life for months, was, you guessed it, an essay on existentialism.
5. If you could add any ingredient to our already world’s best toasties – what would it be?
Goat’s cheese with ash – the best food in the entire world.
6. What are your second/ third favourite hobbies (obviously assuming sailing holds the #1 spot
I really love rock climbing and bouldering – I’ve done some pretty cool climbs up dam walls and cliffs in Spain, I can’t wait to get back there. My third favourite would have to be eating, I’m definitely a foodie, although I can’t cook, even if my life depended on it.
7. Describe what you do for work in less than 5 words?
Well I coach sailing sometimes.
8. What’s the first international flight you are going to book post Covid-19? And why?
It would definitely be a flight to France. I’m lucky enough to have lived and gone to school in rural France, and I’m really looking forward to going back to our house there and seeing all my friends once international travel starts again.
9. What’s your favourite TV show, movie, and or book?
I know it’s basic, but Legally Blonde is just so good. My mum and I have probably watched it over 20 times, and we know the entire movie off by heart. If we’re talking books, I’d recommend The Plague by Albert Camus – even a year of writing about it in my major work couldn’t ruin it for me.
10. Tell us something interesting about yourself that members of the club don’t know?
This is a tough one, because usually my interesting fact is that I sail, but I’d hope that everyone has figured that one out. I guess something that not everyone knows is that I love languages and I’m fluent in French and Spanish. I’m teaching myself Russian and I’m going to study it at ANU next year. Another is that I’m an ever-suffering supporter of the Fremantle Dockers in the AFL – an unpopular choice I know, but I’m holding out for when we win our first premiership when I’m 75 or something.
