IOD Celebrity Invitational Regatta

2025 IOD Celebrity Invitational

August 13 - 15, 2025

Nantucket Race Week is pleased to announce the 21st annual running of the IOD Celebrity Invitational.

Karen Ryan Photography

Introduction

Imagine being provided a boat within a fleet of evenly matched IODs to be raced by your crew on Nantucket Sound. Further imagine having an America's Cup tactician, Olympic medalist or a world champion calling your tactics for the regatta. In keelboat one-design racing this is truly special.

Karen Ryan Photography

The Celebrity Invitational begins with an opening reception buffet dinner at a private home, with Master of Ceremonies Dawn Riley, followed by two days of racing and more social events. The series will consist of up to four races each day on Nantucket Sound. Each participating team will have a celebrity tactician on-board. Races will be sailed in a fleet format, and prizes will be awarded for daily and overall results. Opportunities abound for non-sailing spouses and significant others to explore and enjoy the island: beaches, bicycling, water sports, shopping, museums, sightseeing and more.

Karen Ryan Photography

Schedule of Events

2025 IOD Celebrity Invitational Co-Chairs:

Roy Weedon -- 2025 will be Roy's third year chairing the Celebrity Invitational. A celebrated participant in his own right, he's been on the podium multiple times, and won the event in 2022. Roy is co-skipper of the local Sierra Syndicate IOD squad, and has a long list of achievements in the Class, having sailed in nine IOD World Championships, and claiming back-to-back North American Championship victories. He has helmed his team to top honors in Nantucket's season-long series multiple times.

Steve Ulian -- Steve Ulian is a Nantucket Yacht Club member, the Island's Rhodes 19 Fleet Captain and a past co-chair of Nantucket Race Week. Steve grew up sailing at the Wianno Yacht Club on Cape Cod and sailed for 4 years at Boston College. Steve went on to campaign for the Olympics in Star Boats finishing 11th at the 1988 Olympic Trials. After the trials Steve worked for North Sails Marblehead where he won the J/22 World Championship, twice finished second at the J/24 Worlds and won the Etchells North American Championship.

Principal Race Officer:

Tom Duggan -- Tom Duggan is one of the most accomplished Principal Race Officers in the world. His involvement with Olympic sailing dates back to 2004. He ran the Laser Class circles for the 2016 Rio Games. In 2021 Tom served as PRO in charge of all sailing events for the Tokyo Olympic Games. He is a certified International Race Officer and is Past Chair of the World Sailing Race Management Sub-Committee. He has served on multiple committees with both US Sailing and World Sailing and is currently Chair of the US Sailing Race Management Committee. He has run races all over the world, but his home waters are Nantucket Sound, where he can be found lending his skills and watchful eye to the IOD fleet on a weekly basis.

Master of Ceremonies:

Dawn Riley -- As CEO and Captain of America True, Dawn was the first woman and youngest person to manage an America's Cup sailing team. She raced on four America's Cup and two Whitbread teams. A documentary of her first Whitbread Race on-board Maiden was released in 2019. She is a former president of the Woman's Sports Foundation, served on the board of US Sailing, and is an adviser to several public service organizations. Dawn has been in Oyster Bay, New York at Oakcliff Sailing since the inception in 2010. There she is building American leaders through sailing. A non-profit open to all, Oakcliff's signature Acorn and Sapling programs train athletes in inshore, offshore and high-performance sailing. Graduates receive training in all aspects of running a racing campaign from technical to finance to marketing and strategy. Need-based scholarships are provided for all programs, with additional funds for community sailing graduates. Match Racing is the original cornerstone of Oakcliff and the 5 graduates working and sailing with the American Magic team in Barcelona. Oakcliff trains offshore sailors, including 89 who were spread over 6 boats in this summer's Newport to Bermuda Race. The young trainees are inspired by other graduate's successes, including Mark Towill and Charlie Enright who won the last Ocean Race. Finally, Oakcliff has invested deeply in athletes trying to compete in the Olympics, providing small group training, organized week long camps and 5 ‘Triple Crown Regattas' where athletes can race and earn grant monies for their campaigns. Dawn is included in the National Sailing Hall of Fame, the America's Cup Hall of Fame, and the State of Michigan Sports Hall of Fame, the only person with this triple honor.

2025 IOD Celebrity Invitational Tacticians:

Lara Dallman-Weiss -- Lara Dallman-Weiss is a two-time Olympian (Tokyo 2020 and Paris 2024) and current US Sailing Team athlete. She grew up sailing on White Bear Lake, MN, where she was somewhat of a polymath-athlete, honing skills in basketball, track, and cross-country. During her summers, she was busy sailing in Inland Lakes Yachting Association competitions. Her love for competitive sailing blossomed as Captain of the Eckerd College team, leading them to a 3^rd Place in the 2010 Women's Nationals. After college, she spent five years on the pro circuit racing with a range of teams from Etchells and Melges 20s to Farr 40s and Perini Navis. During this stint, her credits included the 2016 Farr 40 North American Championship aboard Flash Gordon, a 1st in the C&C 30 class at the 2016 Key West Race Week, 1st at the 2016 Etchells Pacific Coast Championship as main trimmer, and 3rd at the 2014 Women's Match Race World Championship, as part of the Epic Racing team continued to race and work with a diverse range of teams until landing in the top ranks of the 470 Class.

Lara teamed up with Nikole Barnes for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics but switched to sailing with Stu McNay when the 470 discipline became mixed gender for Paris 2024. The pair won U.S. Olympic Team Trials – Sailing in January of 2024 and went on to represent Team USA at the Paris Games where they finished 13th.

This is Lara's first try at the Celebrity Invitational. She promises to teach us how to get an IOD up on a plane.

Rod Favela -- 2025 will be Rod Favella's third year as a Celebrity Tactician. Rod grew up sailing in the coastal town of Puerto La Cruz, Venezuela, where Sunfish were the 'big thing' in dinghy one design racing. Simultaneously, he also developed his love for offshore racing in the Caribbean. Coaching was a mandatory part of the sailing education he went through and he helped hundred of sailors of different ages get and improve their sailing careers.

In 2005, Rod moved to the US where he kept racing dinghies and keelboats on both One Design and handicap scenes but he never left out the coaching and support of other sailors. He also started his own sailing outfit business providing specialized support and equipment for racers and cruisers; always looking forward to make sailors take advantage of the best of the sailing program.

Rod is a coach for North U and keeps racing in several classes. During his time in the American sailing scene, Rod has been part of the winning teams on North American Championships on VXOne, Hobie 33 and US Sailing Championship of Champions as well as very successful path on the offshore such as victories on the Chicago – Mac, NYYC regattas and other top finishes including the Herreshoff trophy. He is also a part of the winning crew at the 2021 J/22 World Championship, 2022 J/24 World Championship, J/80 North Americans and World Championships.

Ultimately Rod remains active in the racing scene, while sharing his time with his sailing business and coaching, giving back to the sport.

Al Girard -- 2025 will be Al Girard's third turn as a Celebrity Tactician, and he looks to repeat history – having guided Pierre Crosby's Delta team to victory in 2023. Raised in a family of local sailing royalty, Al Girard grew up in Barrington, RI, a hotbed of the sport. He was on the sailing team at the University of Rhode Island where he graduated in 1983. Al has been an avid Laser sailor, competing in the Laser Worlds, taking 3^rd in the 1995 Laser Nationals and winning the Laser Master North Americans in 1996. In 1993, he was the first alternate for the US Olympic Laser team. Al won the North American Interclass Solo Championship in 1994 and repeated in 1995.

Stepping into the world of big boats, Al was the navigator on Courageous IV in Perth Australia in 1987, vying for the Luis Vuitton Cup. He has been a pro tactician aboard numerous Farr 40's, and won the 2001 Prada Trophy and Americas Cup Jubilee as tactician aboard the 12 Metre Hissar. His training credentials include serving as offshore sailing coach for the US Coast Guard Academy. More recently, Al has downsized his preferred craft, having become an avid kite boarder and wing-foiler. He has stayed close to his roots, residing in Newport, RI.

Stuart Hebb --

Stuart Hebb is returning for his third Celebrity Invitational. Like the Parkinses, Stuart's first time in the event was as a participant. His credentials, however were too scary for the other competitors, so he was ‘promoted' to the rank of Celebrity in 2024.

Stuart grew up sailing in Nova Scotia, and won the Canadian World Youth Championship in 1982 in the Lightning class. He was on the Canadian America's Cup team in 1987 in Australia. Stuart has a well-balanced sailing background having raced extensively in one designs as well leading the Thin Ice offshore program. The team won the 2005 Pineapple Cup, setting a best corrected-time course record which still stands today. Thin Ice went on to capture back-to-back SORC victories in 2019 and 2020. Stuart was a member of the Canadian Olympic sailing team in 2012, campaigning in the Star Class and finishing 4th in the medal round race in Helsinki as well as numerous top-five performances in the Etchells Class majors. Stuart most recently won top Corinthian in the Melges 20 class in 2024.

Will Hundahl -- 2025 will be something of a homecoming for Will Hundahl. Will spent many summers visiting his grandmother on the Island before enlisting as the racing coach at the Nantucket Yacht Club. He captained the ever-competitive College of Charleston sailing team for two successful seasons before launching into the ranks of pro sailors. He has accumulated an impressive list of podiums, including winning the Etchells New England Championship, earning a second place the 2017 J111 Worlds, First in Class in the Marblehead to Halifax, Annapolis to Newport and Vineyard races. Will has eclectic tastes in boats. He regularly campaigns an Etchells, but when asked what his favorite boat was, he replied 'Nellie', Nat Herreshoff's 1903 gaff-rigged cutter.

Will is based in the Salem loft of Doyle Sails, where he's learning the art and science of sail design from the masters, Robbie Doyle and Jud Smith (both Celebrity Invitational veterans). Nantucket welcomes Will back to the Island!

Travis Oldenbach -- 2024 was quite a year for Travis Odenbach. If there was a Grand Slam of sailing, Travis achieved it last year, having won the J24 Nationals, the J24 North Americans and the J24 Worlds. As if that wasn't enough, he followed up in World Championship in the J24 with another gold-medal performance, winning the J22 World Championship just two weeks after finishing his sweep of J24 titles.

Travis grew up sailing in Rochester, NY where he currently resides and works. Since 2005 Travis has competed in multiple fleets ranging from the Farr 40, J22, J24, Viper 640, Lightning, J70, and sailing some IRC regattas. In 2011 Travis Won the J/24 North Americans, and in 2022 Travis won the J/22 and J24 North Americans and placed 3rd at the J/70 North Americans.

After a successful 8-year turn at Quantum, Travis took charge of the Junior Program at the Rochester Yacht Club, which also allowed time for Travis to continue competing at a global level. 2025 will be Travis's second appearance in Nantucket Race Week's Celebrity Invitational.

Barry Parkin -- Barry has crossed the line from participating skipper to Celebrity Tactician for this year's edition of the Celebrity Invitational. Barry's sailing credentials are long and deep, and his domination of the 2024 event suggested that we had a ringer in our midst!

Originally hailing from Leeds, England, Barry now resides in Riverside, CT with his wife and fellow Olympian, Sue. Representing Great Britain, Barry is a two-time Olympic competitor in the Soling class in 1996 and 2000. He is a past winner of World, European, North American and National championships in a variety of keelboats. Notwithstanding his US residency, Barry served his native England as past chairman of the British Olympic Sailing steering team. Barry continues to compete actively in Etchells and IC37s as a Corinthian, is known to frostbite in the competitive Riverside fleet, and does the occasional match race and team race.

Susie Parkin -- Two Olympians for the price of one! Susie is the other (better?) half of the Parkin sailing dynasty that has agreed to guide teams in the Celebrity Invitational. Susie is a three-time Olympian for the British Women's 470 team, having competed in Seoul (1988), Barcelona (1992) and Atlanta (1996). She earned bronze medals in the Women's 470 World Championship as well as the match-racing Worlds. Now residing in Greenwich, CT, Susie remains an active competitor, racing regularly in J|122, IC37 and Ideal 18 classes, and going up against husband Barry in the Dyer frostbiting fleet.

Even when not holding the tiller, Susie remains active in the sport as a coach and organizer for youth sailing events. Susie's and Barry's off-time is still on the water, when they're doing long-distance cruising in their Oyster 625, Papillon.

Adam Roberts -- A San Diego native, Adam began piling up sailing accolades at an early age. While at Point Loma HS, he was a six-time High School National Champion, sailing in both team race and fleet race disciplines. He followed that up with a successful college career, sailing alongside teammate and Celebrity Invitational winner Taylor Canfield at Boston College. His BC team sailed to two National Team Racing victories, and Adam was a four-time College All-American. Post-college, Adam had a very strong run in the 470 Class, ranking in the Top 20 worldwide in both 2010 and 2011, and winning the 470 North Americans twice. As tactician, he's won the US Match Racing Nationals, the Wilson Trophy, and more recently the 2023 NYYC Invitational Cup and the 2023 Lipton Cup.

While this is Adam's first time sailing the Nantucket Race Week's Celebrity Invitational, he carries on a tradition West Coast royalty like Mark Reynolds, Peter Isler, Dave Ullman and JJ Fetter guiding our teams around Nantucket Sound.

Past Celebrity Tacticians: