With the 5 week of our summer courses nearing completion, our young sailors were surprised to see their instructors busy getting the dinghy park cleared and tidied this morning. What was happening? 
Well at 10:30 Annalise Murphy paid the Club a visit. With Irish Sailings Performance Director James O’Callaghan in tow, Annalise completed her temp check and logged in. The pair were welcomed to the Club by Vice-Commodore Ciara O’Tiarnaigh, General Committee member Stephen Boyle, Senior Instructor Matthew Cotter and Centre Principal Hugh Gill.
The kids were then trated to an extended question and answer session with Annalise. The kids had plenty of questions to ask, from her first sailing course experience, her feelings on finishing the last race in Rio and taking a siver medal to even her butter preferance.
Annalise played a blinder, answering lots of questions and enthralling her young audience with her exploits in London and Rio, meeting Usain Bolt, Moth sailing, her Volvo Round the World experience and even reminding us that she sailed in Sutton in our All Ireland Inter-Schools event back with High School back in 2003.
There was even a special moment for one of our instructors Joe Doherty, who happens to be the owner of a Laser that Annalise had used in Rio for her pre-Olympic training. Having autograhed the boat, Annalise finished up the morning with a one to one with each of the various course groups and their Instructors and a chance to see her Silver Medal up close. Thank you Annalise and James for providing each of these young sailors with an inspiring and memorable moment. Good luck Annalise and hope you get to Tokyo and get a chance to race at the Olympics again.