This is the first race of the New Year in the Hampton Roads area, and it honors Dana Dillon, one of the southern Bay’s most superb sailors and racing skippers, who originated this race. Dana was the 37th Commodore of OPCYC, a member of HYC, and skipper of Amarylyn, which he raced quite successfully in Southern Bay races. Dana liked to race on New Year’s Day so that he could state for one day that he had raced every day of that year! After Dana crossed over to Fiddler’s Green, the race was renamed in his honor, to be thereafter known as the Dana Dillon Memorial New Year’s Madness (NYM) Race.
After crews enjoy a hearty breakfast at HYC, the race gets off on a mercifully short pursuit race of just under six nautical miles out of Hampton Creek in front of HYC, around the Hampton Bar, and then finishing in Mill Creek off of the Old Point Comfort docks.
This race is famously known in the Southern Bay as “out of the (HYC) bar, around the (Hampton) bar, and into the (OPCYC) bar.”
Following the race, skippers and crew slowly drift into the OPCYC clubhouse for awards and a bountiful, crowd-pleasing post-race feast.
For the Notice of Race and more information about registration, please visit opcyc.org or contact Tim Etherington at [email protected] or (757) 690-3178.
See you on the water on January 1 for a little New Year’s Madness!
