Kurt Taulbee

Kurt is an experienced sailor specializing in Laser sailing, a 14 feet, one man Olympic-class dinghy. Kurt was born in Buffalo, NY, grew up sailing on the Niagara River, and was a member of the Niagara Sailing Club for many years. Since 1977 he has competitively sailed a variety of boats including Sunfish, Laser, Finn, Hobie 16, Albacore and lightning.  For several summers he campaigned as crew on a C&C 38 (taking many top honors) on Lake Ontario.  He has 2 gold medals and several others from the New York State Empire Games.  Kurt has completed Laser campaigns for the Savannah, Sydney and Athens Olympic Games. These campaigns have taken him to many countries including Chili, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Netherlands, Denmark and Spain as well as extensive travel to the Pacific Coast, Atlantic Coast and the Great Lakes area. He has been a member of the US SAILING Team twice.

Kurt started SAILFIT in 1994 after graduating from the University at Buffalo with a Masters degree in Engineering Management. His undergraduate degree is in Electrical and Computer Engineering. Instead of pursuing a corporate career he created a business around sailing that gave him the opportunity to sail and earn money. This allowed him to travel for regattas and training and to continually make progress in his sailing.  Kurt has been teaching sailing seminars and clinics for over 10 years. He is the coach of the Clearwater Sailing Team and also coaches other teams and individuals at regattas. Kurt also conducts clinics and coaches for US SAILING sponsored championships. Teaching clinics and coaching has taken him to Cartegena Columbia, Tortola BVI,  The Columbia River George in Oregon, and many other places in the US and Canada.

In 2003 Kurt married Meka Aiken, a bank officer from Buffalo, NY. Kurt met Meka at the bank and because she was sailing local regattas and her father and stepmother live aboard a sailboat, a connection was made between the two immediately. Kurt and Meka set off at the end of 2000 for a whirlwind, non stop campaign for the Athens Olympics in 2004. They traveled extensively for the campaign and eventually found themselves in Clearwater, Florida.  Since Meka had been training for fitness competitions it was a natural step for her to become a certified trainer and train sailing athletes that were campaigning for the Olympics. It was Meka’s idea to change the name of the business to SAILFIT (previously Great White Performance Racing, and then Performance Sailing and Fitness).  She put the fitness into SAILFIT. Kurt’s sailing and Meka’s fitness was, and still is, a perfect match.

Currently, Kurt is living in Clearwater, FL with Meka and their son Kai who was born in May of 2005. Kurt is coaching the Clearwater Sailing Team, teaching clinics and preparing to compete in the upcoming US SAILING Team qualifier regattas. 

Visit our sailing page to follow Kurt’s racing and to see what Kurt & Meka have been up to lately.