PRSA Executive Committee

Scott Snyder -

Robert Bennett - Raised in New Orleans, when I was age 8 I learned at Southern Yacht Club to sail Optimists and I began to race with other Optimist sailors all along the Gulf Coast.  Later I raced 420's for SYC with my brother during high school, then I switched into Lasers when he went off to college.  I then sailed for the University of Texas at Austin sailing team throughout college.  After moving to the DC area in 2001, I raced  Vanguard 15's in Annapolis and eventually began racing Lasers and Lightnings on the Potomac with the PRSA.

Yates Dowell - Yates and his wife Judy started teaching themselves to sail about twenty years ago. Soon after that Bob Laughlin asked him to crew on his Albacore and he loved it. Later on he crewed on a Hobie cat also. Then, Yates went out of town for a week on business and while he was away Judy and daughter Lisa bought a used Hobie as a surprise. So the family had a boat to race and they've been racing ever since.

Mike Heinsdorf - At the age of 11 at summer camp, Mike went sailing for the first time.  He fell head over heels for the sport, but he had to wait to go sailing again.  The following year at camp, he got his skipper's certification which meant he could throw off the shackles of having a counselor on board with him and took out four female friends as crew.  Fast forward to college orientation at Drexel: while reading over a list of student activities, he found out that college sailing was a competitive sport. A week later, he was in his first college regatta, staring at the sterns of 420s helmed by ODU and Navy.  The racing bug had bitten.   Fast forward again to 2004 when he showed up at PRSA on a 30 knot plus March day and found everyone on the docks watching Barney doing his thing in an Albacore.  Mike bought an Albacore the following year and has become an advocate for the boat and fleet.

Nathan Marsh -

Jeff Neurauter was introduced to sailing when he earned the Sailing merit badge at Boy Scout summer camp in northern Minnesota.  By the end of the week, he had fallen in love with sailing and a year later he bought his first boat, a Sunflower.  Jeff did not know that people raced sailboats until many years later when he saw a group of boats sailing around together.  He followed them around the race course and was instantly infected by the competitive bug.  Jeff began actively racing when he moved to Alabama and joined the Browns Creek Sailing Association on Lake Guntersville.  Since then, he has cruised and raced dinghies and keel boats around the U.S.  Jeff also served as the sailing coach for 2 years at the U.S. Military Academy, West Point, NY.  He currently focuses on one-design racing in Buccaneer 18s and J105s and enjoys cruising the Chesapeake Bay in his Catalina 27.  

Erich Hesse - grew up sailing Sunfish in the summers and JY15's during the winters.  He sailed throughout his four years in college -- lucky guy.  Five years ago, he came to PRSA and began sailing with the Laser fleet during the winter.  He is half of a husband-wife teaml on his Albacore during the warmer weather.

Frank Gallagher joined the Alexandria Sea Scout Ship 145 at age 14. They had an old Lightning we sailed and worked on it constantly. I raced my 1^st PRSA Presidents Cup in it…we were so last, the R/C boats picked up the finish line/weather mark and brought it down to finish us as we were just rounding the leeward mark so they didn’t have to wait too much longer to leave. I was hooked and have been sailing Lightnings ever since. My mom, a nurse at the old Alexandria hospital gave me the ok to sail with Doc Gilbert, a surgeon she knew. Shortly after that and I was on the Lightning circuit. Did the legendary Quantico regatta (100 boats) with Doc, while my dad was with Col. Joe Kelly and my brother John was with Richard Bolton. It was quite a surprise when my older brother Mike opened his Leatherneck Magazine in his cot in Da Nang, Vietnam to see a pic of his dad capsized at the jibe mark, with the caption  ...”Air Force Col. Joe Kelly and crew can’t handle heavy air at Quantico.” We bought our own lightning and I’ve be sailing out of the WSM ever since. My younger sister, Maureen, sailed with me and against me for years and my older sister, Patricia, was with me when we made the front page of the wash post sports section with post reporter Angus Phillips aboard following a 60mph summer squall capsize. My wife Maryann has raced with me for years and we still daysail quite often. All my kids have sailed / raced with us at one time or another…..so yep, it been a bit of a family affair!!!

Past Commodores

Pat McGee (2009-2010) -- My brother, with proceeds from crabbing the Rappahanock River, bought a how-to-sail book, a Penguin and an Aqua Cat. He taught himself, then our family how to sail. I was 10. I suspect he needed more weight on the back of the cat, as it had a tendency to submerge. By 19, I was chartering big boats on the bay. Quit sailing at 22. In 1999 I needed a life change, strolled down to PRSA and crewed for Joe Warren in a lightning. The racing bug bit, the next season I sold the Triumph TR4 and bought a lightning. Thanks Joe. (I do miss the car.)

Jeff Storck (2006-2008) first learned to sail on Oyster Bay, Long Island on his Fathers Lightning #556, Ariel at the tender age of 4 years old. His Dad started putting the tiller in his hands almost immediately and fostered a love of the wind and water that he has never lost. Since then Jeff sailed a number of different types and sizes of boats - Hobies, Lasers, 505's, Rhodes 19, Flying Scott, and Keel boats of verying descriptions, but never forgot that beautiful Lightning he learned on so long ago. Then In 1998 Jeff bought his first very own Lightning - #10215 Black Adder, joined PRSA and started racing. Three boats later, Jeff now is the proud owner of Lightning #15256, named Ariel after the boat his father taught him to sail on. After three years as the Lightning Fleet 50 Captain, Jeff has taken the reigns of PRSA as Commodore.

Nabeel Alsalam (2003-2005) first learned to sail in high school when he built a wooden sailfish out of a kit.  He had great fun sailing and capsizing it on the James River and planing like mad as the winds kicked up before a storm.  But he didn’t start racing sailboats until the early 1980s when a colleague at the University of Rochester recruited him to do forward crew on a Thistle.  He has been hooked on one-design sailboat racing ever since.     In 1997, he decided he had enough of crewing on other peoples’ boats.  After checking out the fleets at PRSA, he settled on the Lightning because the fleet is strong and the 3-person spinnaker boat reminded him of his Thistle days.  From day 1, he has been very active in that fleet. He is also one of the crazies who go sailing all winter long on Lasers and if you are crazy too, he’ll find you a boat to borrow.  In his day job, he is an economist at the Congressional Budget Office, but who cares?  He’s married with two kids, but he has failed to get any of them hooked on the sport.  He is still trying.

Jim Graham (2001-2002) and his wife Susan learned to sail on the White Nile in Sudan at the age of 37!  Subsequently we've sailed 505's, Fireballs, Albacores and Lasers (me), with uniformly mid-fleet results -- it pays to learn to sail young! I served as Commodore for PRSA in 1999-2001 and have rejoined the executive committee as a member-at-large with time on my hands to help out sailing on the Potomac.  We hope to sail as long as we can rig the boat!

Christopher Bolton (1998-2000) (Chris) has been with PRSA since '84 or '85, sailing Hobie 16s and then a Hobie 20. He also sails with the winter Laser fleet. He has served as the Hobie fleet rep,and PRSA Vice Commodore, Rear Commodore, and Commodore. Chris' family has a summer place on Mobjack Bay (very close to the Ware River Yacht Club, well known to the Albacore Fleet), and he grew up loving the water. " I never had the good background of Opti or college sailing, which may be one reason I like the speed of a cat and not the slow tactical boats", says Chris in his bio.

Ben Ackerman -