Fagen/Goss Olympic 49er Sailing Campaign: About Us

David Fagen

Skipper

David grew up sailing in St. Petersburg, FL. His first sailing experience was at age 5. He sailed an Optimist Pram in a local yacht club race. That was the beginning of David's sailing career.
Sailing every weekend and dragging his parents around the country to competitions, David gained the experience to learn what it takes to win. He bought his first boat at the age of 9 using money from working as an actor in a professional theater production. He bounced back and forth between acting and sailing for much of his teenage years.
As David grew, he moved out of sailing Optimists and started sailing Double handed(Two Person) boats and the occasional big keel boat. At age 14, he upset the 420 National Champion to qualify for the US Sailing Youth Double Handed Bemis Championships finals at the United States Naval Academy and was exposed to one of the best college sailing programs in the country.
David passed up acting and decided to serve his country as a Naval Officer and went to the Naval Academy. It was not an easy path, but the challenge and the sailing were too irresistible. The sailing team won Dinghy Nationals 3 of the 4 years David attended the Naval Academy, 2 of which David sailed in. After graduation, David continued sailing whenever possible. He even managed to put together a team to sail in the J-22 World Championships the week before the regatta. The boat fell from the hoist and was damaged two days before the regatta, but the team managed to patch the boat up and sail to a 5th place(Top Non-Pro) in David's first J-22 regatta.
While in the Navy, David managed to be able to sail Flying Dutchman World Championships when time would permit. The Flying Dutchman taught David more about tuning of boats and differences in boat speed than anything in college sailing. The Flying Dutchman is also a very fast boat and gave David a taste of boats with speed. When the Flying Dutchman was voted out of Olympic Competition it appeared that a high performance boat was not going to be an option for David's Olympic dreams. Then in 1997 the Olympics found a new boat to add to the line up, the 49er.
David found a way to be able to start sailing more and immediately dug into his savings and bought a 49er. He was a couple of years behind some of the other teams in the training so he decided to use the lead up to the 2000 Olympics as a learning and training process.
David resigned from the Active Duty Navy in August 2001 and is currently pursuing a berth in the Olympics for 2008

David is currently the President of the US 49er Class Association and the VP of the Flying Dutchman Class.

Ned Goss

Crew

Ned grew up in Madison, Connecticut on Long Island Sound, Ned Goss has been sailing for 23 years. At the age of ten he started racing Lightings and Blue J's, and at 14-years-old placed fifth in the Blue J Nationals. When he was 16, he placed second in Semi Sears.

Within the past three years, Ned has competed in many sailing events involving several different types of vessels including Fireballs, 49er's, SR 33's and J 30's. Ned crewed on the top U.S. boat in the Fireball World Competition held in Tampa, FL 2002. Prior to the World's, they won the Fireball Nationals in 2001, 2002, and 2003 as well as the Eastern Regionals in 2001, 2002 and 2003. Also to his credit is a second place in the 2001 Fireball North American Championships.

Ned has also been part of a winning crew aboard a J 30 by the name of Sampson. She came in first for her class in both the Charleston Race Week and Charleston Leukemia Cup for 2001.

Since 1992, Ned has taught sailing to both adults and children, and has aspirations to become a member of the U.S. Sailing Team in the 49er class. His goal is to be participating in the 2008 and beyond Summer Olympic Games.

Currently Ned Goss lives in Charleston, SC where he graduated from the College of Charleston.

Roger Hall

PR / Pit Crew

Roger is from Portland, Oregon. He learned to sail on the Columbia River in 1990 and has been hooked ever since. Roger can often be found at Cascade Locks on his Hunter 25. Although, Roger is not a racer himself he is a big supporter of competitive sailing.
He has been instrumental in helping Team Fagen/Goss find product sponsors. Roger also organized the 2003 US 49er National Championships.

Roger has worked in the HVAC industry, Media Field and Roger is an independent manufacturer sales representative in the sporting goods industry and a professional fundraiser.

To contact Roger please e-mail him.