Will Farnell Named ORCV Youth Sailor of the Year
Will’s story doesn’t begin with podiums or plaques.
It starts where many good sea stories do — with family and an old boat. His grandfather, Harry “Pa” Farnell, first caught the sailing bug in Bendigo. After moving to Geelong, Pa joined the Royal Geelong Yacht Club and passed the obsession down the line. First to Will’s dad, Jason. Then to Will and his sister.
“My first memory of sailing is Wednesday nights on Pa’s Van de Stadt 23,” Will says. “Just the two of us. Rigging it together after school. That’s where I started learning — not just sailing, but how everything worked.”
That early start gave him a head full of know-how and hands that already knew what winches were for while most kids were still learning to jibe a dinghy. Though he began in cadet dinghies in 2017, it was keelboats that got his full attention. Offshore was calling, and Will didn’t hang about.
In just three years, he’s already:
Completed three Apollo Bay races with his dad on their Adams 10, Valiant
Raced offshore for the first time at 14
Delivered Iain Murray’s 37-footer Dark and Stormy to Sydney
Brought Chutzpah (Caprice 40) home from Hobart
Jumped aboard TP52 Smuggler after cheekily asking to crew at the dock—then raced and delivered her alongside Tim Davis
He’s not in it for the Instagram likes. Offshore sailing, he says, taught him real responsibility. “You have to stay dry, stay warm, and keep your head. Because other people are counting on you.”
Will’s already completed ORCV’s Foredeck Essentials Course with Peter Downey — “I learned heaps about dip-pole gybing,” he says — and works two years deep at DYSC Marine Supplies in Geelong, tightening his links with the boatbuilding and sailing community.
Talk to anyone who’s sailed with him and the same words come up: calm, curious, switched-on. Will doesn’t bang the drum or chase attention. He watches, listens, learns, and shows up. That’s how he ended up on some of the best boats in the fleet — by being quietly brilliant.
How did he feel about the award? In true Will style: “It’s something to be proud of. I’m grateful.”
What’s next? A race around the world, if he has anything to say about it. Europe, maybe. More deliveries. More offshore miles. “I don’t want to work inside,” he says, with that easy grin of someone who already knows where he belongs.
There’s even talk of a father-son double-handed Hobart campaign. But first, a likely tilt at the Devonport race aboard Dark and Stormy later this year.
From backyard boat sheds to TP52 cockpits, Will Farnell is quietly charting his own course — and ORCV is right to be proud. The ocean’s got a new name in the game.
And he’s just getting started.
Photos provided by Will Farnell Will (far right) with father Jason (far left) on ‘Pa’s’ boat with fellow sailing friends Charley S and Josh G. Will helming on Smuggler with Tim Davis Will on the helm of his father’s boat Valiant by Tom Smeaton About ORCV: A leading authority on ocean sailing, racing and training in Australia, the Club was formed so that ocean races in Victorian waters could be efficiently developed and run by an organisation focusing specifically on the needs of ocean racers.