The Salty Dawg Founders Award, given out annually, recognizes the contributions of an individual who most embodies the guiding principle of the Salty Dawgs, established by our founders, Bill and Linda Knowles, “Sailors Helping Sailors”. This award acknowledges the best of us.

This year’s award was presented to a man who has almost single-handedly educated the entire fleet: Alex Helfand!

Alex runs the Salty Dawg educational webcasts.   (He is also the primary driver behind the GW Medical benefit included with all our offshore rallies.)  He has been running this program with professionalism and creativity for years, hosting zoom webcasts almost year-round.  Amazingly, he dutifully attends and moderates most of them, even the not so interesting ones - and he can’t even multitask with his sound and video off like maybe some of us do!  His consistent dedication to this important Salty Dawg benefit has educated countless members in a wide range of topics, profoundly enhancing this organization while contributing to the safety, confidence, and skill of our members.