Shocked Sailor winds up in water | Hawkes Bay Sport | Surfing, Rugby, Soccer, Football, Cricket in Hawkes Bay

A REGULAR runner-up during key regattas most of last year, teenage sailor Olivia Mackay was quite determined to start her new year with a bang.

Yesterday the 13-year-old had stars in her eyes but it wasn't the variety she was expecting at her Napier Sailing Clubrooms.

Instead, the rude wake-up call came in the shape of a 25-footer Noelex yacht as it rammed into her relatively tiny boat on the Ahuriri waterfront early in the afternoon during the final day of the annual New Year's Regatta.

One second the Woodford House pupil caught the large yacht bearing down on her seven-footer, Amazing Grace, the next the wobbly P class sailor was sporting a lump on her head from an accident that left her concussed.

"It just crept towards me and I just freaked out," the Napier club member told SportToday late yesterday afternoon, recovering from one of two accidents that left young sailors shaken.

Napier club general manager Lyle Tresadern, who was on one of the 14 rescue boats that also helped tow eight boats to shore, said the racing officials were aware of the forecast on a balmy day and were expecting the up to 27-knot gusts in the afternoon.

Sailing on an open course in the P class with other experienced sailors, the 2010 year 10 pupil was sailing upwind when she saw several four-man crewed Noelex craft coming downwind. Then, from the corner of her eye, she caught one bearing down on her.

"I tacked over [moved from one side of the boat to the other to change direction] and then it all happened in a split second.

"It was like a bang and a crash," she explained as Amazing Grace half-capsized.

"I got hit in the head from some part of the other boat and I fell in the water," she said.

 She was stunned but found the strength and courage to correct her boat before hauling herself out of the water as the other boat, Corporate Rich, with Neil Absolum and John Healey among the crew, sailed off.

Mackay had enough presence of mind to signal to a rescue boat about 50m away as marshals Adrian Natusche and Rob Capon whisked her away before another rescue vessel towed Amazing Grace to shore.

Hawke's Bay urologist Kim Broome (pictured) , whose three children were also competing at the weekend, attended to Mackay before clearing her of any serious injury.

"He [Dr Broome] told me I'd be feeling sick for a while. I was swelling up above my right eye and I got dizzy too," said Mackay, whose shocked mother, Dawn Mackay, was contacted and was promptly at the club before the young sailor had been brought ashore.

Amazing Grace got away with a few scratches on the hull and the sides.

And, yes, in case you were wondering, Mackay finished runner-up to clubmate Keith Inglis in the P class.Shoc