race report
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 As the shadows got long, a pair of J/24s, Backwards and Shut Up and Drive ghosted around Red Rock in a counter-clockwise direction. ©2014 norcalsailing.com |
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This Is a Fiasco!
January 26, 2014 It was a Dark and Stormy night. We've always wanted to start a story like that. Read on and learn how we got the chance.
Saturday's Three Bridge Fiasco had 357 entries, and 336 started on a dimishing easterly breeze. Their mission was to start and finsh (in either direction) the 21-mile race off the Golden Gate YC race deck, sailing (in either direction) around Blackaller Buoy near the South Tower of the Golden Gate Bridge, around Red Rock near the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, and around Yerba Buena, taking them under the Bay Bridge twice. Since it's a pursuit race, the slower boats start first, and everyone else tries to catch up.
On the day of the race, the Coast Guard continually issued a Securité on VHF 16 about the "approximately 350 vessels sailing the vicinity of the Central Bay." Shipping traffic was a huge issue for the racers in the singlehanded/doublehanded event, especially in the morning. Five ships intersected with the morning starting sequence: two outbound tankers, one inbound tanker, an inbound cruise ship that looked like a floating city, and an inbound container ship. The first inbound ship made it through the Gate without incident. The outbound tanker had a near miss with a sailboat south of Angel Island, and the ship's pilot called the race committee on 69 to report that the racer "failed to give way." The offending yacht called in shortly after and withdrew from the race citing mechanical problems. The cruise ship had a few sailboats to contend with, and one of her tugboat escorts laid on the horn five times just inside the Bay. By the time the container ship approached the Golden Gate Bridge, slightly after 11:00, the racers on their way from Blackaller Buoy to Red Rock were strung out like a pearl necklace between the two towers of the bridge, going nowhere fast, as the nice little breeze that graced the start had pretty much shut down and the ebb was running strong. Thus began the first wave of drop-outs, and the most we've ever heard coming in as quickly as the RC volunteer could acknowledge them.
The sailors going the opposite direction, down the Cityfront toward the Bay Bridge had their own obstacles, large and small, to contend with. The Three Bridge Fiasco coincides with a swim meet that goes from Pier 41 to Aquatic Park. Their escorts were concerned that the boats were coming too close to the swimmers. The racers were seeking current relief along the shore and often lost steerage due to the lack of wind. The Alcatraz ferry Old Blue and other tour boats called the race committee to complain about "sailboats adrift" near Pier 39. From the perspective of the sailors, the tour boat operators behaved recklessly, perhaps out of frustration, going too fast at the harbor entrances. Vessel Traffic even got in the act, calling on the race channel to report "a multitude of vessels loitering and anchoring near the entrances to Piers 39 and 41," and to ask the sailors to keep the area clear for the ferry traffic to go in and out.
More drop-outs radioed in. Lori Dennis on the Cal 2-27 Jack Aubrey, which may have been part way there already, said they were going to Half Moon Bay. The J/120 Twist said, "We're ahead of arch-enemy Mr. Magoo so we're retiring." Retirement parties started popping up at places like Angel Island and Sausalito.
Around mid-afternoon, a nice little westerly filled in finally propelled the remaining racers away from San Francisco and the Golden Gate Bridge. In the North Bay, the water looked like glass, but a light northerly kept boats moving on a negligible flood.
As the sun approached the horizon at 17:00 and again after dark at 18:00 came two more waves of drop-outs, as it became clear that any hopes of finishing were futile.
"It sure was frustrating yesterday fighting the currents in the light winds," said Mike Dvorak of www.sailorsenery.com. He sailed with Erich Ochs on the Moore 24 Hasta Nunca. "My estimates may have been slightly high," he said Mike Dvorak of his forecast for the day. "I sometimes find myself being overly optimistic in the forecast, always hoping there's enough breeze to sail the course." At 18:05, Alan O'Driscoll and Brian Wade on the D-Class catamaran Beowulf V (sometimes sailed under the name HMB Boys and Girls Club), crossed the finish line – without running lights, so they were disqualified! At 18:20, Darren Doud and Chris Lewis on the Corsair 31R trimaran Roshambo were under the Bay Bridge and making their way toward the finish, but at 18:45 they called it quits, stuck at the Ferry Building with only 15 minutes left until the 19:00 deadline. But all was not lost on this sea of despair. One monohull, the 1D35 Dark and Stormy, sailed by Jonathan Hunt and Rodney Hagebols, crossed the finish line at 18:40:52. You can read their story in Part 2.
In the meantime, you can check out the preliminary results on the Singlehanded Sailing Society's website, www.sfbaysss.org.
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