What do Southern MD Sailing Association (SMSA) racers do in January? Well, about 35+ members of SMSA, both sailors and their outstanding support crew, headed south to sunny, warm Florida. Ok, so maybe not too sunny at times, and not too warm, but certainly better than the winter blizzard facing most Marylanders.
There were three regattas all taking place in the Sunshine State within about a 10 day period. The VX One Midwinters in Sarasota, Dead Dogs and Tin Whistles Regatta in Key Largo, and Key West Race Week. Seven SMSA boats competed in the various regattas which tested everyone’s skills.
SMSA was represented in Key Largo with two Buccaneers: Wasabi sailed by Jimmy Yurko and Evan Scott and Christopher Dragon sailed by Jim Whited and Jenn Marbourg-Miller. Storms cancelled their racing on Friday and gale force winds cancelled Sunday racing as well. However, they did manage to get in five races on Saturday with Wasabi finishing third and Christopher Dragon fifth.
The VX One Midwinters in Sarasota were represented by Water Rat sailed by Mark Witte and Dan Bowman. The weather was very interesting with temperatures in the mid to upper 60s most days and the skies partly cloudy. The team arrived late Wednesday night, and Thursday morning started putting the boat together, got in a practice sail in the afternoon, and was ready for Friday. However, Thursday night saw lots of rain, lots of wind and an EF2 sized tornado in Siesta Key about 10 miles from where we were staying.
Friday morning brought more rain and high winds, so the Race Committee postponed racing until the afternoon when they managed to get in 2 races. Saturday was the best sailing day, five races, great wind and sunshine. Sunday, similar to the Buccaneers in Key Largo was a complete blow out, with sustained winds of 30 mph gusting to 50 mph. The Race Committee consulted the white caps on the puddles in the parking lot and decided to cancel racing. Although they kept improving their position, Water Rat ultimately finished 20th overall, until they attached some small shrubbery to the keel sometime during Race four on Saturday.
Key West Race Week was represented by three GP 26s and 1 J70 with 25 SMSA racers, crew and shore support. Skippering the boats were Clarke McKinney on the J70 (Family Truckster), and Peter D’Arista (Supra Turbo), John Edwards (Rhumb Punch), and Mike Beasley (Rattle N Rum) on the three GP 26s.
Mary Anne McKinney, shore support extraordinaire reported the following for the J70 Family Truckster:
“Captains Log - first day of racing a J70 - Clarke, Neal, Hawk, and Steph came home with plenty of bruises, hitting speeds of 15 knots. Finished the last race with a jib alone. The low light was being hauled out at 6:30pm. All races abandoned day 2.”
“Captains Log - Day 3 confidence in boat handling improved dramatically. Moving up in the standings, just need to be careful with fouling or being fouled on the course. Each day getting better.”
“Captains Log - Day 4 most valuable player Casa de Blender. Relief granted after tough day on the course. Crew work continues to improve. Learning more about shifting gears as the wind lightens. Somehow the class needs to let clean sailing prevail. Let the sun shine.”
Ridge Turner who crewed on the GP 26 Rattle and Rum wrote a great article for Sailing World documenting the on the water activities for the ORC 2 Division. Some of the highlights are included here, but you really need to check out the complete article at http://www.sailingworld.com/fast-company for the entire adventure.
Tuesday, Jan. 19 - Bringing it to the Big Stage
As a PHRF sailor used to racing in the light breezes of the Chesapeake Bay, with the occasional offshore race to Halifax, Bermuda, or Newport, you can imagine my surprise to be invited to crew on one of three GP26s, the new hot sportboats designed by Jim Donovan. The GP26, for those of you unfamiliar with it, is a fast, fun and affordable rocket ship capable of keeping pace with Farr 280s in our ORC 2 division.
Our journey from SMSA’s Wednesday-night “Sails and Ales” around-the-cans racing to the big Key West stage involved many hands. The assemblage started with Peter D’Arista, owner of hulls No. 7 and 10, and his idea to bring Solomons Island’s best to Key West. He gathered his crew from Supra Turbo and friends from Rhumb Punch, another Key West regular since 2006, and said “Let’s make this happen.”
As things fell into place, it was evident that two GPs just weren’t enough, so Serhad Ceftici, the GP26 boatbuilder from Turkey, brought his own boat into the fray. Hull No. 7 wasn’t delivered until New Year’s Eve (that’s only 18 days before Key West), but with ace Patrick Edwards putting the boats together and rigging them all, three GP 26s found their way from Maryland to Key West in race shape. It has truly been a team effort with all hands working on boats and getting them ready. Contributing to the effort was Evolution Sails’ Rodney Keenan, who outfitted the boats with new sails. Mike ‘Moose’ Beasley and Joe Gibson, from Annapolis, completed our lineup.
In conditions that were 14 to 18 knots and lumpy, every imaginable right and wrong occurred. For example, fighting a strong current, the GP26 Rhumb Punch fouled the pin boat’s anchor line and had to reverse off to recover.
The GP 26 Supra Turbo found their mast inside the backstays of the Farr 280 Diesel during the second start. As the team untangled itself, the fleet pulled away, but in a reversal of fortune and regaining much needed karma points, they retrieved a man overboard at the top mark. As if this wasn’t enough excitement for one day, during a port-starboard crossing situation, right-away Supra Turbo manage to find the bowsprit of the Farr 280 Standard Deviation lodged between its aft lifelines, which unceremoniously plinked off with without injury or damage.
Racing on Tuesday was abandoned, with winds gusting into the low 30s out on the Gulf, so we all had plenty of time to repair both pride and boats. Though we all said publically we should have been racing, there were many, myself included, who were glad to have time to recover.
Friday, Jan 22 - The Perfect Storm
The trip out to the racecourse on Friday morning was deceptive. Overnight the wind had moved to the south/southwest and built to 18 gusting to over 20 knots, but in the basin at the Galleon it felt quite calm. We raised the main in the lee, turned the corner and headed out. Of the three GP26s, Rattle and Rum was the only boat willing to race today. We had a lot of reason to head out no matter what, sitting only a few points out of first place; there was still a chance to overtake the J/80 Wired. Turning out of the channel and up toward the racecourse we were glad we had brought seven crew on the boat. Little did we know that 20 knots would be the lightest we would see [that] day.
There are many phrases sailors use to describe heavy conditions. “Dude, it’s nuking,” “Breeze on today,” “Man, it’s heavy out there,” all come quite short of how it really felt. We did a quick spinnaker set before the start to make sure we all felt we could handle it, as the wind was up enough that not executing the set right would very likely lead to a broach or a dismasting. We had a quick set and clean douse and got into our pre-race sequence. I personally was a little nervous about flying the spin as we had two new crewmembers onboard to replace our jib and kite trimmer Joe Gibson, who had to go home to attend to a family emergency, and our bow girl Devon Feusahrens, who ended up in the ER after rolling an ankle on Thursday. As it turns out, I was justifiably concerned.
Watching the J/122s and J/88s coming down the course to us I knew we would have our hands full with the spinnaker. I counted three broaches and saw many other boats just on the edge of control, but we needed a Hail Mary to overtake the J/80 for the lead, so I was excited to hear the call from our skipper Moose Beasley at the offset to hoist. I eased the main for the bear away and prepared for the boat to take off.
I remember thinking as the mast hit the water, “I need to get my foot untangled from this line or I will drown as the boat starts moving again.” There was a moment of silence and calm as I struggled to free my foot and get clear of the boat, already fully on it side. As my head broke the surface I felt myself being pulled back on the boat. My longtime friend and beach cat sailor, Steve Elgersma, had for the second time in my life pulled me out of harm’s way.
Key West has been truly awesome and I know I will be coming back again next year.
Signing off until then.
Final tally in Key West: Family Truckster was 39th in the J70 division, and in the ORC2 Division Peter D’Arista (Supra Turbo) was 8th , John Edwards (Rhumb Punch) was 5th , and Mike Beasley (Rattle N Rum) was 2nd.
So if you want to hear about warm-weather racing in January and missed all of this year’s excitement, just talk to one of the SMSA folks listed below. I’m sure they will share the stories of their adventure with you.
Key West Race Week (Key West, FL)
Clarke & Mary Anne McKinney
Neal & Lacey McKinney
Hawk & Stephanie Caldwell
Sarah Southworth
Megan Hildenberger
John & Linda Edwards
Patrick Edwards
Sandy Leitner & Joe Szymansky
Scott Patterson
Shawn & Laura Stanley
Peter D’Arista & Mary Kay Roma
Devon & Lauren Feusahrens
Michelle Januzzi
Ridge Turner
Craig & Susie Hodan
Don Behrens (RC Extraordinaire)
Dead Dogs & Tin Whistles Regatta (Key Largo, FL)
Kristi & Jimmy Yurko (Annabelle & Cora)
Jenn & Rob Miller (Evie Miller)
Jim & Barb Whited
VX One Midwinters (Sarasota, FL)
Mark & Robin Witte
Compiled by Robin Witte with contributions from Kristi Yurko, Sarah Southworth, Megan Hildenberger, Ridge Turner, Mary Anne McKinney.
