Ocean Elements to sponsor this year's Blaze Nationals at Instow

The 2018 Blaze Nationals will be held at North Devon Yacht Club © NDYC

Ocean Elements, one of the UK's largest sailing, yachting and water sports holiday specialists, is sponsoring the Blaze Nationals for the first time this year. It also sees the company's MD and keen sailor, James Hardiman, join the race as he takes up the challenging of learning how to sail a Blaze despite still recovering from shoulder surgery earlier this year.

This year's Blaze Nationals is being held at James' local yacht club, the North Devon Yacht Club, in Instow on 8 - 10 June. The Blaze Class Association and NYDC are excited about this year's event and look forward to welcoming you to the Blaze, Fire and Halo National Championships.

The Blaze Nationals is a three-day race with a social, or perhaps it's a social with a race attached!? There's a dinner on Friday night with the band Gypfunk - a quirky quartet from North Devon performing curiously engaging French songs - ideal for a romantic night out albeit with a few of your mates around! And Saturday is barb-e-que night. As many of you will already know, North Devon is a great place to visit not just race, with miles of beautiful coastline and long sandy beaches to explore, it's the perfect break.

Each racer will receive a GPS tracker record of their race or races and Ocean Elements will be providing each sailor with a free t-shirt. Hartley Boats provided a £25 sponsorship towards discounted entry for every early registration, and the Blaze Class Association, Allen Brothers and ADM sails have also agreed to sponsor the prizes.

James, who is also racing in the Solo Fastnet and the complete Offshore series with the Solo Offshore Racing Club (SORC) this summer, comments on the event, 'The Blaze happens to be a boat that is raced a lot at my local club, the North Devon Yacht Club. The Club asked if Ocean Elements would like to come on board as one of the race sponsors so I'm delighted to help. I have an interest in the boat because (although I don't sail one yet!) they're always ahead of me and we work with Hartley Boats at our Beach Clubs in Greece.'

For more information on the Blaze Nationals please visit www.blaze-sailing.org

For more information on Ocean Elements please visit www.oceanelements.com