The Cruising Club of America is looking for nominations for its prestigious Rod Stephens Trophy for Outstanding Seamanship. I hope the club gets a really good variety of suggestions, because last year it took what to my mind was a very odd tack in giving it to the professional Volvo Ocean racers on ABN AMRO Two.

They had recovered a crewmember who was swept overboard sans lifejacket or harness in the North Atlantic. Although they got him back on board, tragically the crewmember in question, Hans Horrevoets, did not make it.

There must be many cruising people out there achieving great feats. Problem is, most of them aren’t high profile or well-publicised. If you know of any deserving candidates, you can contact the CCA’s awards chairman Robert Van Blaricom at janebobvb@comcast.net.