Mid-Month Midwinters

February 14, 2011

RegattoPRO Winter One-Design

RegattaPRO wrapped up their series on Saturday, sailing west of the Berkeley Circle, north of Treasure Island.

"We ended the RegattaPRO series on a beautiful day," reported Jeff Zarwell of RegattaPRO, "with wind coming from 285 at 6-10 knots all day. At one point the wind died for a few minutes, but it came back and everyone finished the second race before 3:00.

"We were very lucky this year, as it never rained and we had wind (eventually) for every race. What made it best were the great fleets that showed up again this year and not a single protest."

"NOAA got it right," said Rich Hudnut, who sailed aboard Timo Bruck's J/120 Twist, "we had 12 to 14 in the morning, sunny skies, warm temps. The wind got lighter but never shut off. Made for some fun upwind/up-current sailing, but with weather like this in February, who cares. We sailed all the way back to South Beach, and the weather was so nice, we just kept going, cracked beers, went past Hunter's Point, saw Candlestick, turned around and went home."

Jeff was pleased with the series. "I need to thank Sausalito YC for stepping up and supporting this event this year as well as a great race committee. It's so much easier when you have good people helping out. Looking forward to a busy summer and hope to see everyone out there!"

See the results of the RegattaPRO Winter One Design Series at www.regattapro.com.

Berkeley YC Midwinters

BYC Race Chair Extraordinaire Bobbi Tosse filed this report on the last weekend in their series, sailing on the Berkeley Circle:

On Saturday, 55 boats showed up and 55 finished. Sounds trivial, but for some of our smaller yachts, this was a red letter day. They finally got to finish a race! There was a warm and gentle breeze from around 270 and wonder of wonders, we were able to start on time.

Our experiment of trying to create a course for our ten deeper draft boats in Division A almost worked. Since it was a course featuring a downwind finish and since Division A was the only division sailing this course, I worried that we could experience a mess with boats finishing in both directions. No problem. All eight Division A boats racing were done almost 15 minutes before the first Division B boat arrived. In the bar talk later that afternoon, there were some other conclusions regarding the success of this adventure. It seems that a few of the Division A boats showed up at GOC downwind from Southhampton at the same time that all the Express 27’s arrived from upwind. The downwind boats with spinnakers, needing to come down and needing space to round, had some concerns. In addition, even though this course was supposed to be in deeper water, a few boats still managed to find the muddy places. When I mumbled something about charts and depth sounders, I was told they “needed” to go to the place of no water to dodge the current. Oh, well.

As shown in the cumulative results, almost all of last month’s ties are now resolved. In Division E, that tie is resolved in Robert Schock’s Achates' favor since her firsts were last.

On Sunday, we had 26 starters and finishers. It seemed that by Sunday, the Bay itself was getting antsy for some rowdy weather. It is winter, after all. Around 11:30, the breeze was still from about 270, but it was much lighter and there was a thick fog hanging out. (When we checked in with VTS they assured that we should get some ‘viz’ soon. Amazingly, they were right.) We started on time and an eight-mile windward-leeward course was chosen.

Dean Treadway's cold-molded Farr 36 Sweet Okole looked sweet on Sunday. ©2011 Laela French

When the lead boats had managed only two miles in a little over one hour, we elected to shorten to a five-mile course. Naturally, as soon as were set, the new breeze kicked in along with a 45+ degree shift to the left. This meant each leg was now a speedy little reach and all 26 boats finished in 30 minutes.

Peter Cook and crew on the Ultimate 24 For Pete's Sake. ©2011 Laela French

Next on our agenda is our strange and wonderful Champions of Champions, also known as the Trophy Winners Race. On Sunday, February 27, all of the firsts of both days will vie for the Kirt Brooks Perpetual trophy. So that these firsts won’t be lonely and because we can, the next division will feature all of the seconds. They will be followed by all the thirds and fourths. Around 1700 at BYC that day, we hand out all the trophies for the season.

Results are up at www.berkeleyyc.org.

Island Days

Island Yacht Club's midwinter Island Days Race on Sunday had a pleasant breeze. Clear air away from buildings, catching the right breeze, and
avoiding crowds of boats gave skippers an advantage.

The Moore 24 Crazy Eights prepares to tack. ©2011 slackwatersf

The largest boat was probably Invisible Hand, a J/111. Pictures are online in a gallery. Results will be posted at www.iyc.org/racing.html.