Got Wind Got Richmond Beer Can

August 22, 2010

John Cabrall of Got Wind and Water filed this report after last Wednesday's Richmond Yacht Club beer can race:

Avid sailors know what it takes to get together to sail.

Personal connections.

It takes time, it takes effort. It often takes a chance encounter. It might take signing up on an online crew list and crossing your fingers that you'll get an invitation from an owner. If you are an owner, crossing your fingers as you click through the profiles, hoping you'll luck out.

The reality is that it's easier to make friends out of sailors than it is to make sailors out of friends.

One online group is using the Meetup.com platform to turn that around. The Meetup concept is to connect online, then meet up offline. The focus is not the online profiles of members. The focus is NOT a friends list, or a wall, or a database, or list of links. The focus is getting together offline in events that are focused on the activity itself. What is online is the result of those activities. Comments, photo albums, a calendar, upcoming events… even video.

For the Got Wind and Water group, that doesn't mean holding events where people stand around a bar at a yacht club, or walk the docks of a marina. It doesn't mean hours of experience in a sailing school. It means getting out there on boats. Mixing seasoned sailors, newbies and virgins. The yacht club bars, sailing schools come later. Walking the dock is about getting to a boat, not hoping to find a boat that needs crew.

Last year, during one of the early sailing events of the group, a co-founder summed it up in a pivotal statement. They'd just completed getting the boat, a C&C 110, back under control on the circle. They'd broached with the chute up in the slot, and the newbie mainsheet trimmer was just beginning to understand her role in controlling the boat. The seasoned sailors were patiently and calmly helping the no-longer-virgins understand the recipe of fun: equal parts adrenaline and confidence, with a dash of experience.

The co-founder calmly leaned over and said:

"You know, character is revealed quickly on a sailboat"

It's not something you learn on the dock, or in a bar. You learn these things on the water.

On August 18, one of our members, Aaron Kennedy, owner of Ay Caliente!, hosted the Got Wind and Water membership at the Richmond YC Wednesday night beer can race. The GOTWAW part of the event was designed to open up the group to additional Beneteau First 36.7 owners. In addition to Aaron, and Dick Green of El Jefe, two other 36.7 owners shared their passion for sailing with the group. Tom Bruce joined the group and added a member to his crew on Serendipity II, and Stuart Scott added a member to the crew of Bufflehead.

Hangin' out on Ay Caliente! ©2010 John Cabrall

The race started with the typical mayhem of too many boats maneuvering in too much wind in the narrow Richmond Inner Harbor. No lives were lost. El Jefe misunderstood the starting time, and when the rest of the fleet took off, Dick Green got the hint that the race had already started and joined the back of the parade in a nice breeze. Ay Caliente! and Bufflehead got out of the channel first and turned south as the breeze started to slacken. Serendipity II headed up the middle and El Jefe followed. It was the typical dilemma we often face on the Bay. Balance the constantly changing pressure against the constantly changing current. Go to the left, up the middle or to the right?

The start. ©2010 Janet Wolf

By the time El Jefe got to the mark the breeze was going bye-bye but the current was in full force. Bufflehead, Ay Caliente! and Seredipity II had gotten around and were following the current back home. By the time El Jefe had gotten around the high tide at the Southhampton platform, the wind was no more. Kristian, one of the members and new to San Francisco Bay, acted as a human pole (with a boat hook as an arm extension) and attempted to be a wing man. But there was little apparent wind with the current carrying us about as fast as the wind was going in the same direction. The solution to that dilemma was to eventually push the button and call up the iron wind.

The big smelly mark. ©2010 John Cabrall

Serendipity II had gotten past Ay Caliente!, but Bufflehead crossed the finish first.

On a mild summer's eve, new friendships were forged between members of the Beneteau First 36.7 owners and members of the Got Wind and Water group. Sailors all, they were just doing what comes natural - messing about in boats.

Broadside, a J/24. ©2010 John Cabrall

For some additional comments and photos, go to the Got Wind and Water Event page.

- John Cabrall, Got Wind and Water

The RYC beer can series continues through the end of September.