The Skiff Sailing Foundation is pleased to announce that Barry and Betsy Senescu have donated the Class40 Yippee Kai Yay to be campaigned by Team Aurora. Team Aurora brings together international women sailors with a shared goal of competing at a high level while creating opportunities for women in sailing. Connected through The Magenta Project network, Aurora is now developing an all-female Class40 program centered on the Transpac, together with West Coast training, racing and offshore skills development. The donation of Yippee Kai Yay gives that program a boat with an unusually appropriate history. Barry and Betsy have dedicated the gift in memory of Susan C. “Sue” Senescu and Arent “Barry” Schuyler—two people whose own involvement in sailing helped create opportunities for women to pursue ambitious goals on the water. SUE SENESCU AND YIPPEE KAI YAY Yippee Kai Yay was conceived around Sue Senescu’s own offshore racing ambitions. By 2008, Sue had already sailed four Transpacs. She raced the 1995 and 1997 editions with all-women crews, returned aboard Horizon in 2003, and finished second in class aboard Madrina in 2005. She was also a Transpacific Yacht Club director and a Staff Commodore of Dana Point Yacht Club. For what she hoped would be her fifth Transpac, Sue and her husband Barry commissioned a new Class40 from designer Jim Antrim, built by Columbia Yachts in California. Yippee Kai Yay was described at the time as the first Class40 built in California specifically for Pacific Ocean racing. Sue was not simply the owner of the finished boat. She was closely involved with Antrim and Columbia throughout its design and construction, down to the deck hardware and sail-handling systems. Because the boat would sometimes race with all-women crews, she paid particular attention to making the systems efficient to operate without depending on brute strength. Safety features, handholds, tether points and a layout suited to shorthanded sailing were also part of that thinking. The result was a boat shaped in part by Sue’s experience as a woman racing offshore. She continued sailing Yippee Kai Yay and also used the boat to help introduce others to offshore sailing. In 2015, members of the JSerra Catholic High School sailing team trained aboard the Class40, learning navigation, offshore safety and big-boat sailing. That history now continues with Team Aurora. ARENT “BARRY” SCHUYLER AND LIZ CLARK The second dedication reflects a different but closely related sailing story. Arent “Barry” Schuyler was a UCSB professor, environmentalist and sailor in Santa Barbara. When a young Liz Clark was trying to turn her dream of sailing and surfing around the world into something real, Schuyler helped provide the opportunity. He first offered Clark his own Contessa 26, Freya. Clark sailed the boat extensively but eventually concluded that it was too small for the life and voyage she had in mind. Rather than ending his support there, Schuyler proposed that Clark save half the money needed for a suitable boat and that he would match it. Together they acquired the Cal 40 Swell. Schuyler then remained involved during the extensive refit, helping Clark prepare the boat for offshore sailing and plan the voyage. In 2005, Clark sailed from Santa Barbara aboard Swell, beginning the long sailing and surfing journey for which she later became widely known. Schuyler recognized an ambitious sailor, put a real resource behind her, and helped her develop the skills and platform needed to pursue the opportunity herself. A NEW CHAPTER WITH TEAM AURORA The boat will be prepared for West Coast training and competition as Aurora builds toward the Transpac. Along the way, the program is intended not only to develop the team itself, but also to create opportunities for more women to gain meaningful offshore racing experience.