Old or young, you’ve gotta love the intimate competition of small boat racing, where you can look your competitor in the whites of his or her eyes on the line, and then help put each other’s boats away at the end of the race. We’ll start with the elders, because they started first, on Saturday morning at 0900, in 8-ft El Toro prams off the Sausalito waterfront, headed for the San Francisco Marina. The fleet made quick work of the 55th Annual Bullship Regatta, hovered over by ‘cowships’ (bigger boats) ready to rescue any Toros in trouble. Indeed, a cowship did swoop in to pick a capsized boat and its shivering crew out of the Bay - before the race had even started!

Less than an hour later, the first boat had crossed the finish line at the end of the spit at Golden Gate YC and touched the guest dock at St. Francis YC. We asked the winning skipper, Art Lange, if it was a record year. “It's under an hour from the start - 55 minutes, so maybe.” Art’s not sure how many Bullships he’s done, too many to count, but this was his first win. He compared it to a blind pig finding an acorn in the woods. Sooner or later it was bound to happen. “Of course this is all a gamble, You have to thread the needle between wind and currents.” The ‘right way to go’ this time was close to the SF shoreline for relief from the ebb. “I was going to go land sailing but decided to do this instead. Go 50 mph or do the Bullship,” said Lange.

Art hones his El Toro racing skills with the HP Sailing Club on Wednesday nights at Cupertino’s Stevens Creek Reservoir. See www.hpsailingclub.org/index.html for info on that series. Also see www.eltoroyra.org for lots more on El Toros, including complete results and a race report. Twenty-two boats finished this year’s Bullship. The top ten skippers were: 1 Art Lange; 2 Buzz Blackett; 3 Dennis Silva; 4 Fred Paxton; 5 Vickie Gilmour; 6 Nick Nash; 7 Gordie Nash; 8 Paul Tara; 9 John Liebenberg; 10 Chris Straub.

As the Bullship racers were hauling their craft out of the water at the busy St. Francis docks, herds of high schoolers were splashing theirs, about to begin the NorCal High School Championship Regatta, held both days this weekend off the Marina Green in CFJs. Kids from all over the region enjoyed the sunny skies and nine races on Saturday in 5-12 knots of breeze.

Seven races were sailed on Sunday, starting in eight knots that soon built to 15-20 in the afternoon. The regatta had two divisions, each with their own starts. At the end of the weekend, the Burlingame/Homestead team of Matt Van Rensselaer, Chris Ford/Tim Malouf, Ian Simms and Sven Knauth emerged victorious, by a whopping 45 combined points over second place Serra!

Another big small boat regatta this weekend, Richmond YC’s Big Dinghy, featured buoy racing on Saturday for Snipes, Bytes, Wylie Wabbits, Flying Dutchmen, International Canoes, International 14s, Sunfish, mixed multihulls and two open classes. On Sunday, the Big Dinghy wraps up the weekend with a pursuit race around nearby Brook’s Island. This year’s winner was Banshee sailor Craig Perez. For all the results, see www.richmondyc.org/2008-RYC-Racing-Results~138215~13823.htm.