04/30/2019
Amy Bower Says Fair Winds to Team Wind Whisperers
After two successful World Blind Fleet Racing Championships with Team Wind Whisperers, main trimmer Amy Bower is handing over the main sheet to a new team member. This past August Amy took over as Chair of the Department of Physical Oceanography at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, where she has been a researcher for 30 years. The extra demands of this new position and the upcoming college search and application process with her daughter Sara simply will not leave enough time for commuting to Boston for pre-regatta practices and a long regatta in Ontario this Fall.
Amy has life-long memories of the two World Championships from when the team won the B1 division: Chicago 2015 with Duane, Sol and Denis, and Sheboyggen 2017 with Duane, Andrew and Denis.
On the high side, helping Duane achieve his long-time goal of winning his first World Championship in Chicago was a highlight. On the low side, the rough seas on Lake Michigan for one long day in 2015 proved too much for the stomach of Amy, a seasoned sea-going oceanographer, who has sailed the North Atlantic and Indian Oceans without such mal de mer. Maybe it was that extra glass of wine the night before that tipped her over the side, so to speak. The discomfort was tempered somewhat by the thrill of surfing in a Sonar, where the front edge of the keel was exposed for a nearby photographer! Another highlight was sharing the awards ceremony with her brother Tom, a Chicago resident and athletic director at the Latin School of Chicago.
Sheboyggen didn’t have quite the same sea state (thankfully) but many thrills nonetheless. The highlight was the down-to-the-wire victory over a talented B1 team from the United Kingdom on the final day of the regatta. Sharing an Air B&B house with another team from Boston, the Rogue Lemmings, was a good lesson in cooking with a crowd. Teammate Andrew befriended Amy’s guide dog Echo (a.k.a. Lady Echo) and kept her entertained with plenty of fetch games when the team was off the water.
The funniest incident that occurred during that entire week, which makes Amy smile to this day, was when she nonchalantly attempted to throw away an apple core off of the deck of the house. The core ricocheted off of a post right next to her (which of course she couldn’t see) and hit Rogue Lemmings main trimmer Christian "Thax" Thaxton squarely in the forehead. To this day, we are still unsure if he noticed, since he had been “celebrating” copiously that evening. Amy and Denis practically fell out of their chairs laughing about the whole thing. If it doesn’t seem that funny to you, well, we guess you just had to be there!
You can bet that Amy will be following the team’s progress at the September 2019 championship in Kingston. She will miss the team camaraderie and the competition. She says, "Here’s to a Hat Trick for TWW!"
Photo Caption:
Amy snuggles with a dolphin during a recent family vacation in Mexico. She is sitting in waist-high, blue water while holding the dolphin's snout and chin in her hands with their faces close together. Amy is wearing a big, beautiful smile, yellow t-shirt, dark blue PFD and has wet hair. The dolphin looks happy, too!
Photo Courtesy of David Fisichella
