Dawn Riley: Sailing Through Barriers
We wanted to close Women's History Month with an interview with a local powerhouse, a woman who continues to write history and break down women's barriers in the sailing industry,
Meet Dawn Riley, a world-class sailor and the Executive Director of Oakcliff Sailing, a non-profit organization that teaches sailors to race at a high level, while also preparing them for careers in the sailing industry. Dawn herself has participated in multiple Whitbread Round the World and America's Cup campaigns, even being a part of the first all-female crew in a Whitbread Race known as Maiden.
https://www.oakcliffsailing.org/about-oakcliff/staff/
http://www.airphotona.com/image.asp?imageid=10198
Dawn Riley grew up sailing on Lake St. Clair and the Great Lakes with her family, the water, blue and clear, so fresh that you could drink it. Her great grandfather before her had been a sail and canvas maker. Sailing was in her blood. Her dad and mom had a passion for sailing, so much so that they saved up for six years to take their family on a year-long sailing trip. When Dawn was 13, they went from Detroit through the Erie Barge Canal, up to Maine down to Florida, hit the Bahamas, Virgin Islands, Grenada, and eventually headed back to Michigan. During that trip, Dawn, at 13 years old, declared that she was not only going to race in America's Cup one day but also race the Whitbread Round the World.
After that year-long journey, Riley wanted to jump right into the world of racing. However, there weren't any places like The Waterfront Center we have today. Dawn explained that "There were established old clubs in the Northeast and some in California, but Junior sailing wasn't a thing until maybe the 1980s. There just weren't many clubs that had organized youth sailing. It was just, you would go sailing with your family, and we didn't belong to a club anyway because we were saving our money to go sailing."
To sail and race, Dawn had to figure out how to convince adult sailors to allow her to join them on their sailboats.
"I just started harassing people to take me out sailing."
Eventually, Dawn started convincing the right people, and she ended up racing and sailing on all sorts of sailboats, from Etchells to C&C 35s. By the time she was 15, the boat owners were even paying her to work on their boats and deliver them to different races.
She cites her experience as a teenager as the reason Oakcliff Sailing starts their elite sailing program at 15. "That's why here (Oakcliff) we start at 15; because I know I did it when I was 15, and I also recognize that I was still learning (and a little bit dumb) sometimes with some of my decision making, so it gives a little leeway and flexibility here with the trainees."
Dawn attended college at Michigan State University, paying her way with the money she made from sailing. At MSU Dawn joined the sailing team where she raced on Flying Juniors, which are like 420s, but they are more robust and last longer. She eventually was elected Commodore of the MSU Sailing Club. Through college, Dawn juggled schoolwork, being the sailing team's commodore, and working various sailing jobs to continue to pay for college.
Although she was getting a college education, Dawn contributes most of her education to sailing.
"Sailing had been the best education I've received throughout my life."
"There's a bunch of different ways of learning, and generally everyone learns a little differently, but generally it has to be a combo of reading, looking, figuring it out, and then doing it." Dawn learned everything from electronics to engineering, sail making, rigging, and general boat maintenance.
Right out of college she got a job working as a captain of a 50ft sailboat. She was the project manager, in charge of everything from getting the boat ready, to managing the crew and deliveries.
Little did she know her life in sailing would only accelerate exponentially from there.
One day Dawn got a call from a reporter friend named Cindy. She had told Dawn that Tracy Edwards was putting together the first all-female team for the 1989 Whitbread Round the World Race. It was the first time The Whitbread was making a stop in America, calling into Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Dawn was unsure if she should join and didn't know Tracy but gave her a call. Tracy was ecstatic and wanted Dawn to be on board, so she bought Dawn a plane ticket to go to England and try out for the team.
There was no question in her mind that she could do it. She knew she was capable. Before the Whitbread, the most challenging race Dawn sailed was the Port Huron to Mackinac Boat Race, one of the longest freshwater sailboat races globally. The race went from Port Huron to Mackinac Island. "Everyone assumes it's a nice easy peasy race, but no. It was snowing; there were squalls coming through; I got hypothermia, and our mainsail blew up. It was a really tough race." She agreed that it was like training for Maiden without even knowing it.
Dawn knew she had it in her to be a part of the Maiden crew.
"Funny thing is, if you do everything small thing right, the winning is easy. If you do everything right, you're safe. If you do every little thing as best as you can, you're going to succeed eventually. If you do everything you can as best you can in every situation, then you end up going around the world."
She nailed the audition and joined the Maiden crew for the 1989 Whitbread. The race that made history for having the first all-female crew.
Source: The Maiden Factor
People gave her a hard time because she was a woman, but it wasn't anything she couldn't take because she knew her capabilities. "I was just going to do a race. I'm sure there were people who thought it was silly, but I didn't care."
Her family was naïve about the race; they didn't know about it but supported her. Her mother said, okay, have fun before the race started. During the race, Dawn's grandma sent a postcard that reached Dawn down in Australia. It read, "Take your time, enjoy yourself, don't worry; you can always come home and get married. Have a nice cruise, dear." So, no one quite knew the important history she was making.
While aboard Maiden, Dawn played her part as a watch captain, helmsperson, and engineer. When you watch the footage of the Maiden documentary itself, you can see her steering most of the time on her watch. Dawn spent so much time at the helm because she was the strongest helmsperson on her watch, especially in the Southern Ocean, where one of the other helmspeople suffered from asthma.
Maiden finished second and made history, but that wasn't the end of Dawn's racing or sailing career. She only went up from there. [for more about Tracy Edwards and Maiden, read our blog article: https://www.thewaterfrontcenter.org/news/maiden-racingtocreatespaceforwomen] Dawn went on to race in another Whitebread but, found her absolute love of racing with America's Cup. What made America's Cup, so special to her was the heavy technical aspect.
"It is so technical, and you can make little changes and get a little better, and you only need to be a little better than the other person to get a little bit in front, and you still win."
She even created a foundation, America True, to build a racing team for America's Cup to increase the diversity and challenge the gender bias in the sailing community. "That was a mixed team, and we wanted there to be diversity in the sport. Part of that program's aim was to increase diversity, so we did a lot of community outreach."
By the time Dawn was 30, she had raced in two Whitbread's and two America's Cup. This determination, Dawn said, was attributed to the fact that she thought she would have to get a "real job" after she finished racing sailboats. She didn't know that a career could come out of sailing, but here she is today as the Executive Director of Oakcliff Sailing in Oyster Bay, NY.
Oakcliff Sailing is a youth and adult training center for sailors who want to go beyond traditional coaching methods and progress in their careers in the sailing community. Oakcliff is a proving ground for trainees to develop their skills and professional network in the three significant competitive sailing areas: America's Cup, the Olympics, and The Ocean Race (the new name of The Whitbread). Oakcliff's goal is to Build American Leaders Through Sailing.
Dawn came on as a consultant at the inception of Oakcliff to help figure out what the organization's potential could be. She wasn't planning to stay long, but one year turned into three, and that turned into ten, where she still resides today.
As the head of Oakcliff, she prepares her students for a career in the sailing industry. She plays on the theme that sailors are always prepared. Racing, you want to win, so you need to be prepared. Sailing is all about being prepared. That's what Oakcliff is, making sure the students will always be prepared not only for sailing, but whatever life throws at them.
Dawn does a lot of outreach work to bring inclusion and diversity to Oakcliff sailing and the community.
"You can talk about all these things (diversity, equity, and inclusion) all day long, but you just have to do it. The only way it happens is to have equitable and diverse leadership, and then you end up with equitable and diverse teams; it's simple."
As for what Dawn does in her free time, "Nothing, I have no free time." Her life is sailing, training sailors, and running Oakcliff. The good news is because she enjoys what she does, it doesn't feel like work; most of the time, that is.
Her favorite part of sailing is seeing how everything works together, the boat, the lines, the mechanics of it all. "I like the tweaking of the boat, the change of the mast rake, the helm and balance, the waves, the wind, and everything! "
She loves putting together a team and getting them to work together for a positive outcome. Even the team, Dawn says, "I prefer a team; I like the challenge of getting everyone to work in a well-oiled machine to have an excellent mark rounding." But the one thing she would change about the sailing community is the barriers; she would love to break down the barriers to make sailing more accessible and equitable for everyone.
