About us

Bjarne

Bjarne started sailing when he was 6 years old at the Royal Varuna Yachtclub in Thailand where he started sailing the optimist. He moved back to the Netherlands when he was 9 years old where he got selected for the Dutch National Optimist squad and sailed their for a couple of years.

After that he switched to the Nacra 15 where he helmed the boat with with Eliott Savelon as crew. They were pioneers in this new upcoming class and where fighting for the top spots in the fleet securing a gold medal at the 2017 nacra worlds and becoming 5th at the Youth Worlds in China. In 2018 Bjarne started sailing with Laila to qualify for the Youth Olympic Games where a mixed team was required. After becoming 5th at the world championship in their first year together they qualified for the Youth Olympics. After a succesfull campaign we managed to secure the bronze medal.

Laila

Im laila van der meer, 23 years old, living in grou (Friesland, Netherlands). I started sailing when I was 6 years old in my wooden optimist made by my dad. Together with my two older brothers we were always on the road in our camper to compete in optimist competitions. When I was was 15 I started to sail in the laser 4.7. I achieved some top 10 places at the european- and world championships. When I was 17 I saw an opportunity to participate at the youth Olympic Games. It was not a hard choice to switch from the laser 4.7 to the nacra 15 because i really enjoyed the speed and adrenaline in de nacra. After the YOG my olympic dream continued and i wanted to repeat our succes against the big boys at the real olympics.

Loyal to the foil

We are the new foiling generation, which means we could not wait to tame the foiling Nacra 17. Since 2019 we participated in the Nacra 17 TeamNL Paris 2024 project coached by Karel Begemann and supported by the Dutch Watersportverbond & NOC/NSF. After we showed  our steep learning curve the Dutch federation decided to invest in our programme and put the experienced topcoach Coen de Koning as full-time coach on the programme.

Our goal

Our long term goal and dream is going to the Paris 2024 Olympic Games and winning a medal. 

Palmares

• World champion under 24 2022, Italy, Nacra 17
• 8th at the Nacra 17 world championship 2022, Canada, Nacra 17
• 6th at the Kieler Woche 2022, Germany, Nacra 17
• 1st at the Allianz Regatta Worldcup, Netherlands, Nacra 17
• 3rd Youth Olympic Games 2018, Argentina, Nacra 15
• 1st Dutch Championship Open Class 2019, Netherlands, Nacra 17
• 4th Junior WC Risor 2019 u23, Norway, Nacra 17