Congratulations
to the 2024 Recipient

Jerelyn Biehl

NWSA and BoatU.S. presented the Leadership in Women’s Sailing Award on June 8, 2024 at the National Sailing Conference at Southern Yacht Club, New Orleans LA

photo: 

Congratulation to Jerelyn Biehl for being selected as the 2024 Leadership in Women’s Sailing Award honoree.

At the 2024 Annual National Women’s Sailing Conference Presented by Allstate Sugar Bowl at the Southern Yacht Club in New Orleans, the Boat Owners Association of The United States (Boat U.S.) and the National Women’s Sailing Association (NWSA) honored Biehl with an annual award recognizing her record of achievement in inspiring, educating and enriching the lives of women through sailing.

The youngest of 3 children, Jerelyn was born into a sailing family. She learned sailing from her parents and as a teenager learned all things boating at her father’s marine store. She shared sailing with kids during summers in high school and college. After competing for the University of California, Los Angeles Sailing Team, she met her husband on the racecourse. They fostered a love of sailing in their sons, Graham (a two time Olympian) and Cameron (a World Champion) as well.

Biehl has supported women’s and girls’ sailing for over 40 years at the local, national and international levels. Knowing the influence of role models, she served as a Board member of the California International Sailing Association (CISA), which held an annual advanced racing clinic. She and CISA worked hard to ensure there were female coaches and instructors to encourage and teach high-level skills to girls.  

Biehl worked to create more recognition and support for girls’ racing in the 29er class, and this eventually led to a change in the World Sailing requirements for women’s world championships, which had been too restrictive. Around the same time, the International Sailing Federation (ISAF), now World Sailing, was looking for a women’s skiff to complement the men’s skiff in the Olympics. Biehl and a small team worked tirelessly to make this happen.

In 2019, as the second female commodore of the San Diego Yacht Club, Biehl made a concerted effort to promote women’s involvement that year. The majority of Club committees were chaired by women, and she introduced a “Sail with the Commodore” series that helped women who had never raced, or had little racing experience. They were given working roles on boats to build sailing skills. The program also trained and encouraged 130 women to take their boats to Catalina Island for the first women’s cruise at San Diego Yacht Club.

NWSA President Debby Grimm noted that “Jerelyn Biehl has taken on roles that assisted in assuring quality education and fairness in racing, with the goal of attracting more women to the variety of competitive Olympic classes or getting recreational boaters to stretch their comfort zone.”

Biehl has received a variety of awards, including a 2022 induction into the International Snipe Class Hall of Fame, the 2002 US Sailing One Design Leadership Award, the 2023 Peggy Slater Memorial Award of the Southern California Yachting Association, and two San Diego Association of Yacht Clubs awards. She was also involved with the 49erFX Class Association, served as CISA President and Board member, was on the US Sailing Olympic Sailing Committee, and was US Sailing Interim Vice President.

Biehl continues her positions as Vice Commodore of San Diego Association of Yacht Clubs and the SDYC Sailing Foundation Board, President, and CISA Board Member. She resides in San Diego, California. Upon hearing about this award, she said “I can’t express how thankful I am to have had all the volunteers and fellow women sailors with me over these years to make such progress.  We have finally 50/50 representation in sailing in the Olympics!  I’m very grateful for the people who surrounded and supported me including my parents and family, the members of San Diego Yacht Club, and many friends I’ve had the pleasure to race and work with.”

Read the BoatUS Press Release HERE