August 18, 2014

An old fashioned race to an old fashioned destination celebrated the age-old pleasure of a coastal jaunt up to Drakes Bay and back over the weekend. This year the Singlehanded Sailing Society and OYRA teamed up for the Drakes Bay Race, with the SSS hitching a ride on OYRA's quarter wake and the OYRA providing the logistics and race history.

The Beneteau First 40.7 Inspired Environments needed weight on the leeward rail between Pt. Bonita and Duxbury Reef. ©2014 norcalsailing.com

Race 1 heads out from the Corinthian Yacht Club to Drakes Bay on Saturday, and after a pleasant night at anchor, Race 2 heads back to CYC on Sunday. This year's version was about light air tactics and keeping the boat moving under foggy skies, gentle or sometimes non-existent wind and the gentlest of sea swells.

The first monohull to finish, Ray Minehan's Santa Cruz 50 Emily Carr creeps toward the finish boat, Concise, whose crew was waiting patiently in Drakes Bay. ©2014 norcalsailing.com

Greg Nelsen's Azzura 310 Outsider was the next boat to finish, as a brief spell of sunshine lit up the Bay. ©2014 norcalsailing.com

After a long day on Saturday, the normally quiet anchorage was filled with friends enjoying the night anchored alone or in small raft-ups. The Coast Guards granted permission to fire off expired flares, and the night lit up like Independence Day until one errant flare set off a grass fire on the nearby hill. All went real quiet, and after the fire department put out the small blaze, peace returned to the Bay.

Starbuck and Arcadia jockeying for position during Sunday morning's downwind start. ©2014 norcalsailing.com

Singlehanded sailor Randy Leasure on the Westsail 32 Tortuga flew the spinnaker on the trip back to San Francisco Bay. ©2014 norcalsailing.com

Although many racers between the two organizations chose their respective series, some like Stephen Buckingham on the Black Soo Starbuck raced in both. Starbuck is doing both OYRA series with a full crew and the SSS series singlehanded, and after some figuring out how to be scored for both, he signed up twice. "When I heard that I could race singlehanded and be scored in OYRA I thought that would be great," said Stephen. "I'm the odd duck in the fleet being the only boat doing both singlehanded and crewed and didn't want to miss getting the points for both series."

But since this is a beta test for the organizations, there are bound to be some glitches. Sailing 31 miles each day singlehanded, Stephen used an autopilot on Starbuck, which is allowed in the SSS and shorthanded divisions of the OYRA, but not the fully crewed divisions of OYRA. Hopefully the two organizations will do some de-bugging and try again next year to make this race a summer classic for all to enjoy. And probably no more flares.

Once back in SF Bay, it was a breezy, sunny broad reach to the finish. This is Truls Mycklebust's F-27 Raven. ©2014 norcalsailing.com

You can find results from both series on Jibeset. The SSS trophy meeting will be at 1930 on September 10 at Oakland YC in Alameda, in combination with the Half Moon Bay Race skippers meeting.