Bob Koll Sailing Foundation

About Bob Koll

The Foundation is named in the honor of Bob Koll, an Eagle Scout, UCI Varsity Sailor, UCI Sailing Association Commodore, Electrical Engineer, Pilot and Master Rigger for UCI Sailing.

Bob's efforts as Master Rigger helped to sustain and improve the quality of every sailing program he touched. He was also a talented and generous teacher, with a wealth of knowledge on nearly every subject, expertise he readily shared with others.

During his life Bob donated not only his incredible rigging ingenuity and teaching skills, but countless hours and considerable money to UCI Sailing, and other community sailing programs.

After his death, the Bob Koll Sailing Foundation was established to carry on the spirit of mentorship and coaching that guided Bob's life, as well as his passion for sailing education.

We are grateful to both the Koll Family and Carl Reinhart who donated Blacksilver to our cause. Through their gifts Bob will be remembered and loved.

An anecdote of one of Bob's students to the 2003 Newport to Ensenada Race:

I didn't get to know Bob well, but from that one trip I have an incredible amount of respect for him. For someone who is such a good sailor to volunteer himself and his boat to take a group of people who, with some exceptions, had never experienced anything like that before is truly a selfless act. And to have the patience to explain sail trim and pretty much everything else any of us wanted to know about sailing without being the least bit condescending or arrogant is truly remarkable. I'll never forget what he said as we were motoring out the jetty, "Here I am doing something I swore twelve years ago I would never do again." But there he was, doing it again, and essentially doing it for us. I'm sure for him it wasn't really that exciting, just another overnight passage in another race. But I know for myself it was an awesome experience, something I couldn't have imagined being a part of in my wildest dreams a few months before it happened. Of course it couldn't have happened without him and his dedication to sailing. -- Student of Bob.