Steeple Chase 2005; The final distance race !

The race started in light air, about 7 mph, out of the north-northeast, so it was right on the nose and a beat all the way up Barnes and Card Sounds to Angelfish Creek. For part of that time the wind died to almost nothing.

After getting through the creek, they popped their spinnakers and headed a little offshore. The wind has now shifted around more to the east, so they are running pretty much down the shoreline on the Atlantic side of Key Largo, with wind up to 5-6 mph.

Starting to look like some midnight arrivals.

Eric took heart and hope from the fact that nobody had finished yet.

They could trailer down to Anne's Beach and race the second half if they wanted to, but nobody ever does that. I suppose you could win even if you didn't get scored for the first day if you sail the second day and all the other boats sink and you have a faster time than anybody had the first day (the latter wouldn't be difficult this year).

Don't even ask me why Clive was in there with a singlehander. For years it has been an unwritten rule about this race that singlehanders are not allowed, for safety reasons. I thought it WAS in writing, but apparently not. Needless to say, the rule WILL be in writing for next year's race.

Check our home page tomorrow for Rick's story, results, and photos.

So Matt and Dan didn't compete the second day of the Steeple chase distance regatta. This means that John Casy, who is not named as having retired from the race is most likely the new 2005 Harken Distance race series champion, sailing an I-20. It maybe the case that Brian Karr has moved up to second place, with Matt/Dan finishing up at third spot.

More news later

Wouter

Let me be the first to congratulate JC/Kenny on winning the Edurance series. As usual they were the team.

I can not give you any perspective but from our boat as we did not get to converse with anyone else. That is what really sucked as we missed the parties, and the only real reason I go sailing events anyway.

Dan's flight was delayed due to weather in Chicago, so we did not get down to the keys and get the boat set up until about 1:30 in the morning. Get up at 6, finish rigging and head out to the start. A little BS with a few people tacking up through Jewfish creek was about the extent of our socializing. We manged to nail the start and it went down from there. Cat sailor said something about the wind being 5-7, but that must have been measured from the top of Bill Roberts 38' mast. We were moving a little about half way up card sound, but it was slowly dying as we went. By the time we made Angel Fish creek, the tide had changed and there was 0 wind in the creek down at our level anyway. We spent over an hour paddling against the current and walking the boat along the mangroves to get through the creek. We then started a long very slow down wind. As the sun went down we still had about 30 miles to go according to the GPS. A while after the sun went down we ended up totaly becalmed. All the sails were hanging straight down. We thought about paddling into shore at one point, about the time we noticed that, the crab pot bouys were going under our boat side ways. I turned on the GPS and we were making 2.5 mph in the current at about 100 degrees from the direction we needed to go. At this point Dan fell asleep, and I just let the boat go and watched the shooting stars till a slight breeze finally picked up. Not really knowing the area other than there is a lot of rock and coral along the shore with few places to pull out and it was very dark and we had no ground crew to speak of, we figured the safest option for us would to go all the way to the finish. We managed to make it in to Annes Beach a little after midnight.

I really would like to thank the guys on the 6.0 that finished right behind us. Gina did not come down, and all the people we had talked to about sharing ground crew with had either left long before we came in, or dropped out of the race. These guys saved our lives, with not only a ride back to Gillberts, but fed us one of their sub sandwitches they had in the car. Undoubtedly one of the best meals I have ever had in my life. If not for their generosity, we would have been totaly screwed.

Buy the time we got back to Gillberts and showered it was after 1:30. The weather channel was predicting light air for the morning, we had no ride back to Annes scheduled, we were beat from sitting in awkward positions, paddling and willing the boat to move for 16 hours. As such we elected to sleep in, have a large breakfast with tons of coffee and pack up the boat in leisure.

After the Mug and now this I have to seriously rethink my dedication to this distance stuff. Although that is what makes sailing so great, because when the conditions are good, the experiece is unbelievable.

Looking forward to the next one and not missing the party.

Matt