May 27, 2013

The Express 37 fleet had the first day of racing, Saturday, all to themselves. On Saturday, it was blowing like stink all day. The top boat speed on Kame Richards' Golden Moon was 12 knots. Some of the boats had trouble on the run, and Saturday proved to be just a warm-up for Sunday.

Express 37s Elan and Escape havin' some fun with windy takedowns. ©2013 Rick Linkmyer

On the second day, the Expresses were joined by two Santa Cruz 50s, an SC40, an Olson 30 and the Olson 30 prototype Pacific High. The PHRF fleet started second and sailed on the same course. The day started out light, even light enough for a postponement. Crews mistakenly layered up for only a moderate breeze. But a brisk westerly raised white caps on the windward-leeward drop-mark course. Steve McCarthy on the Express 37 Stewball called the racing "hectic."

Bob Harford's Stewball nipping at the heels of Kame Richards' Golden Moon. ©2013 Rick Linkmyer

Eliza Paulling, working the pit on Golden Moon, was in a good spot to observe the wind instruments. "We saw a top gust of 33.3 knots on Sunday, with a steady 30 at the top of the course." The last race on Sunday was three times around, the longest race of the weekend. Kame Richards said, "At the final windward mark rounding, everyone was primed to hoist in 30 knots of wind. We bore away. I said, 'Hold, hold, hold.' It was too windy." Since GM already had enough of a lead, they waited until halfway into that last run, when the wind settled down at 26 knots to set the chute for the final downwind finish.

The other Express 37 sailors gave props to Jack Peurach's Elan, the only one of them that also raced in the Spinnaker Cup on Friday, from San Francisco Bay to Monterey. Elan made it in to Santa Cruz from Monterey on Saturday morning at 0900.

Eight E37s signed up, and seven raced. The one that didn't make it, the Alameda-based Snowy Owl, had a problem with a hatch that made it unwise to take the boat out on the ocean. Terry Alsberg, one of the E37 builders, wanted to get in on the fun, so he chartered a local boat, Escape.

The fleet only raced on Saturday and Sunday, so that the Bay Area boats could accomplish their return deliveries on the Memorial Day Monday holiday – some of them needed to be back at work on Tuesday. The awards ceremony at Santa Cruz YC followed the racing on Sunday. Third place went to a local boat, Brendan Busch's Spy vs. Spy, despite an injury in the fifth race that sent a crewmember to the hospital for stitches.

On the rail aboard Spy vs. Spy. ©2013 Rick Linkmyer

Second place went to Bartz Schneider's Expeditious. And first place went to Golden Moon, which won all but one race. They were given wine glasses for daily prizes, and the overall prizes are beautiful ceramic vases made by Beth Gripenstraw. When he accepted their prizes, Kame said, “Note the four women on our crew. They are very, very strong up to about 23 knots, then we need more horsepower.”

The victorious crew (and crew-in-training) of Golden Moon. Left to right: Aimee Daniel with daughter Mackenzie, Karina Vogen with daughter Anna, Eliza and Tom Paulling, Rebecca Hinden, Kame Richards, Brent Draney, Larry Tuttle, and Rodney Daniel. Missing are co-owner Bill Bridge and Mike Mannix. "Mike spent days prepping the boat to go to Santa Cruz and raced Saturday," said Sally Richards. "But a sore knee kept him on shore Sunday." ©2013 norcalsailing.com

Jay Hickman is on the delivery crew taking Stewball back to SF Bay today. He wrote from the water: “It’s pretty nice! Very little swell, no real breeze to speak of... Probably about a mile visibility in the fog... Making about 6.5 kts over ground... Could be a lot worse!”

The PHRF fleet started on Sunday (so that they could do Spinnaker Cup) and is continuing racing on Monday. We'll have more on that fleet in our next post.

Looking forward deeper into the week, we see 15 Jesters signed up to race on Thursday (El Toros made in Santa Cruz are invited too), with the Concours d'Elegance to follow that evening, with judging in the following catagories:

• Human powered: All materials – All sizes
• Sail: 30 feet and under – Fiberglass (mostly dry sailed)
• Sail: 31 feet and over – Fiberglass (mostly wet sailed)
• Power: Fiberglass – All sizes
• Sail and Power Wood – All sizes

The Santa Cruz 27 and Moore 24 Nationals will cap off the week Friday-Sunday, with Express 27s invited to race on the weekend. It's not too late to sign up! Regatta Committee Chairman Beau Vrolyk said, "We’ll probably get 35 Moore 24s – that’s about a quarter of the boats built. Rumor has it one’s coming from Chicago. You can still enter. A guy showed up to race this morning and asked if he could enter, and the RC said, 'Sure, what boat is that?' The whole idea is to include all these old boats.” On Sunday, Beau ventured to make a guess about next weekend's weather. "The low spot of the cycle will probably be Tuesday, then it will probably be pretty windy again for the Nationals." On Monday afternoon, we've had a few raindrops in Santa Cruz.

See www.madeinsantacruzraceweek.com for much more.