While Billy Jenkins Jr.'s classmates spent the early part of summer heading to the pool, playing video games and going to summer camps, the 12-year-old from Annapolis took a little sailing trip with his father.
Their destination?
Bermuda.
Billy served as a crew member of Genuine Risk in last month's Newport-Bermuda Race, which started in Newport, R.I., and finished at St. David's Head in Bermuda. He is one of the youngest participants to have raced in the event.
Genuine Risk, a Dubois 90-foot racing yacht, won first place in the Class 16 Open Division and brought home the Royal Mail Trophy.
As a member of the 26-person crew, Billy was a crucial component for Genuine Risk's success, according to his father, Bill Jenkins, who was a crewmate on the yacht.
"He [operated] the hydraulics, which is a pretty integral part of the overall package of the boat," said Jenkins, a yacht broker. Billy "would be in charge of the remote control that you push and swing the keel from side to side. He was entrusted to do that, and he did a very good job."
Billy also spent time working with grinding -- pulling sails up and winding the winches -- and manning the helm of the ship.
It was far from a vacation onboard Genuine Risk, as the cabin of the boat was stripped down to bare essentials for racing conditions.
For the 2 1/2 days the yacht was en route to Bermuda, the crew worked in shifts of six hours on deck followed by three hours allotted for rest.
Genuine Risk is owned and sponsored by the United States Merchant Marine Academy, which teaches cadets how to race sailboats as part of their training program. The crew for the race to Bermuda included six cadets and six professional sailors.
Since the race, which he described as "thrilling and exciting," Billy has spent much of his summer with the Severn Sailing Association's junior sailing program, boating on the Severn River and the Chesapeake Bay.
"I sail around in my smaller boat almost every day" in Annapolis, he said. Coach Fletcher Sims said of his intermediate sailing class, which includes Billy, "We do a lot of one-on-one coaching, getting in boats with students, and that really helps."
Billy is no stranger to sailing races. Two years ago, he accompanied his father on a 2,400-mile journey from Quebec to Kings Point, N.Y., the home of the Merchant Marine Academy. Along with six other crew members, the father and son traveled along the St. Lawrence Seaway and the coast of Nova Scotia.
"For those eight days, he learned a lot," Jenkins said of his son's experience.
Jenkins, 51, has been sailing for 40 years and acknowledges that he did not have the same opportunities as his son when he was a boy.
"Back when I was his age," Jenkins said, "I was sailing on 40- and 50-footers, which were still pretty big for the 1960s and 1970s. ÃÂÃÂ Because of my connections, [Billy] has been able to get on some big, fast boats at an early age, and that doesn't really happen very often to most kids."