LONG BEACH, Calif.---There will be 15 winners but no losers among the 30 finalists for Roy E. Disney's Morning Light team when selections are announced Friday after a week of tryouts.

"The week was pretty interesting," said Lindsey Austin, 21, of Honolulu, whose hometown will be the destination for the team in next year's 44th Transpacific Yacht Race. "Everybody had a different sailing style, and that was fun because you get to learn from other people."

The 30, including five women, concluded five days of sailing Thursday. Disney picked four names from a hat and the young sailors then picked their own crews in turn, one by one, like a sandlot baseball crowd. Then, instead of another day of racing around a buoy course, they sailed the four Catalina 37s on a 12- mile race west to a channel marker a mile off the entrance to Los Angeles Harbor and back.

For the first time no selection committee members were on board. The sailors were on their own, as they will be in the race next year.

The team led by Chris Branning, 21, of Sarasota, Fla. finished first, although he wasn't at the helm. That assignment went to Chris Schubert, 21, of Rye, N.Y., who said, "I'd had a couple of days driving, and when they asked for volunteers I said, 'Sure, I'll do it.' "

But winning the last race won't necessarily make the eight crew members automatic choices.

"I think everyone here has a pretty good feeling," Schubert said. "No one can feel like they could have done more. I'm hopeful."

Austin, the navigator, said, "As far as the decisions, some people are at the top and then there's everybody else. I have my ideas, but either way I'm glad I got to come here. It's been a blast."

With the selections made, they’ll all have a going-away sail on Saturday just for fun. Jesse Fielding, 19, of North Kingstown, R.I., who drove another boa Thursday, said, "All good things come to an end, and this will end in a positive way. I'll go away happy." 

Selection committee members are Stan Honey of Palo Alto, who recently navigated ABN AMRO 1 to its Volvo Ocean Race victory; Carol Buchan, Seattle, a world and national champion in various classes; Scott Ikle, sailing coach at Hobart and William Smith Colleges, as well as the 2003 U.S. Olympic Committee Coach of the Year in sailing; and Andrew Campbell, San Diego, a four-time all- American and College Sailor of the Year at Georgetown University.

Gladstone's Restaurant at Rainbow Harbor is a supporting host of the Morning Light tryouts.

 

Finalists for the selection trials (in alphabetical order):


*Lindsey Austin, 21, Honolulu, Hawaii

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