Ellen MacArthur praises Truro High School pupil (From Boating Cornwall)

Shannon Hassett completes JP Morgan's Round the Island Race

9:30am Tuesday 28th June 2011 in Falmouth

Dame Ellen MacArthur paid tribute to the courage of Truro High School pupil Shannon Hassett after they competed in the J.P. Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race at the weekend.

The 16-year-old, from Crofthandy, near Redruth, is part of the Ellen MacArthur Cancer Trust and together with the record-breaking yachtswoman MacArthur was among 16,000 people aboard more than 1,900 boats that took on the 55-mile Isle of Wight course.

And MacArthur was impressed by how Hassett has taken to Sailing like a duck to water on the race’s 80th anniversary.

She said: “I’ve been out Sailing with lots of young people from The Ellen MacArthur Trust and for many like Shannon this is their first experience of this classic race and that’s been amazing to share.

“When we take the young people sailing and they have the experience of being on a boat and living on a boat they experience a great journey.

“Often that journey is nothing to do with sailing it is the journey of stepping out of their illness and moving on with their lives and getting away from treatment or worries about treatment.

“When you are diagnosed you end up in this world where the only thing you are looking at is the exit and when you reach the exit you are lost.

“Often what we’re able to do on the boat is we’re able to just take them away from that and they can look forward and they can step out. For some young people it can have a profound effect.”

Hassett for one has been well and truly bitten by the sailing bug and thanked MacArthur for giving her the opportunity to engage in her new passion.

She said: “I love the excitement that comes with sailing, there always seems to be a real rush involved in it which I like “It’s great to sail with the Trust and I’ve made a lot of new friends through it so to sail with them at such a big event was brilliant.”

The J.P. Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race is the fourth largest participation sporting event in the UK. Organised by the Island Sailing Club, it is dubbed ‘Britain's favourite yacht race’, attracting over 1,800 yachts and 16,000 competitors.

www.roundtheisland.org.uk.

For an interview with Shannon and action from the JP Morgan Management Round The Island Race see video below.