Well thought out polite posts will be ridiculed and dismissed. If you haven't had at least one adult beverage of your choice come back later once you have been properly prepped.
Tomorrow the forecast threatens to be soft so you fly weight bitches better get your little points early instead of sitting on the beach holding hands and giving each other soft gentle kisses. Yes Ricky and Karl I'm looking squarely at you!
Howdy Ding and All!
We have about fifteen - boats offshore in the distance race. Winds are west at 8-10 going to the NW.
Beautiful day in Sarasota. Randy and Jamie are finally getting to sail together after ten years...Ron White and Mike Fahle are driving Lovell and Ogletree's former Tornado with racks, and Mike McGarry and Don Wigston are trying to foil. The Roberts 27 and 30 are in the Gulf with the Stilettos and Corsairs.
Pressure will be coming up this weekend, with a weak front slipping through. SSS is an awesome venue, and the CA boats are already here along with the right coasters.
Best of Luck to the multihull leaders at the US Sailing meeting. I'll try and get some video footage for y'all.
Merry Sailing,
Bert
Ding, I hope you brought your A-game this week. You don't need to worry about the young punks on the water. Sharing a house with me is going to take a toll on your liver....
We need the Rum Handle Cam in full swing.
Bitch the A-game is here the question is where the f!@k are you!?
That would be too much work, we'd be switch the cam out too often. Come on THart, fire it up pretend you still get your boat wet.
Not in the budget and couldn't find a sponsor, but my liver is with you in spirit.
Sell my C-2 for me and I'll get you a handle of rum.
I just purchased an F18 in Sarasota today, however I'm not hanging around for your silly race.
Have to ask.....is throwing a daggerboard overboard part of your a-game? Yeah....we all saw that!
Have to ask.....is throwing a daggerboard overboard part of your a-game?
Less weight, perhaps?
New foiling strategy?
Just taking ETNZ's strategy.
BUMP..."cause this is a catamaran sailing site and this is a big deal. Bueller....Bueller....Bueller
Todd Ricardi has a bullet! Ravi Parent has a bullet!...
Some pressure, but lots of holes today.
It was a short line and good starts were necessary to stay in control of your lane.
Ricky and Dalton are in the lead, with Gunnar in second. Sandra and Alex are up there, so are Luke/JC.
Karl/Beth are sailing well, and so are Laura and Ding.
Katie and I ate an OCS on race 3, along with the 3 other boats that tried to roll me.
Jake broke a rudder pin on the 2nd race and retired.
Rumor is that we will be racing offshore tomorrow with 5 mile legs - should be fun finding a white mark, that far up course, and no GPS allowed...
Cheers, Mike
This is the F18 America's ... right? Like North and South America?
Was wondering how this team got an exemption:
Gunnar Larsen
Ferdinand van West
1785
Den Haag, Zuid Holland
Watersport verbond
Did you race today?
Mike
Was wondering how this team got an exemption:
Gunnar Larsen
Ferdinand van West
1785
Den Haag, Zuid Holland
Watersport verbond
Owning NACRA probably didn't hurt.
After 8
http://www.regattanetwork.com/clubm...
In the past you could have a winner (non-national) and a national champ who came in 2nd or 3rd (scored highest
national
) but was a national.
I'm not sure how it would work for an
Americas
IE
the New World
event.
Fun day on the water today. They kept us inside for another round of W/L courses but added a 90 degree reaching leg from the gate to the finish.
We had great breeze15-18, big puffs, and a few shifts to keep it interesting.
A big shuffle in the standings? Results
Here - http:/
In the coed fleet, Sandra/Alex had a tough day with a DNF, but are closely followed by Annie/Eric.
Sarah and Rob are also hanging in there.
Karl/Beth had a rear beam pull out but Ahpc jumped in and will have them back on the water tomorrow (way to go Jill and Robbie!)
Laura and Ding are sailing well with consistent finishes and no swimming
Katie and I had a couple of huge stuffs on race 3 that sent her up to inspect the snuffer. However we retired before race 4 because of loose rudder/gudgeon/plate issues. We are all repaired and will be back out tomorrow.
That's it for today
Mike
Can't wait to see the video. They've been great so far.
+1
so refreshing to read about sailing on this site.
Was wondering how this team got an exemption:
Gunnar Larsen
Ferdinand van West
1785
Den Haag, Zuid Holland
Watersport verbond
Maybe the F18 rules should be changed so that every championship is Open?
In Europe it is normal (and encouraged!) that foreign sailors compete at each other's Nationals.
This year we had Germans, Brits, French, Belgians, the more the merrier. <img src="<>/smile.gif" alt="smile" title="smile" height="15" width="15" />
From Rick Bliss:........... Fantastic day on the water yesterday at the F-18 Championships is Sarasota, FL. The race committee is doing a great job of getting races off. The strong winds depleted the fleet by the end of the day. I was on a fast power boat with the photographers so we were racing from one mark to the next and Capt Randy was positioning the boat for close in action shots. Flips and stuffs and people flying through the air. A few minor fender benders. A few ripped sails, broken tillers, exhausted crews and a couple of people separated from their boats. The safety boats were kept busy. They tell me there are great videos of the action on Sailing Anarchy. I haven't had time to check. Been too busy. I've extended my stay down here twice. Cold and wind today.
The New England teams are doing very well. Mike and Tripp took a first in one race but almost blew it when they came through the gate and reached off toward the finish line. They stuffed the bows, recovered, tea-bagged, recovered, stuffed again and Mike steered from behind the beam. The second place boat quickly closed the gap but Mike held them off. Following that boat after boat stuffed on the tight reach and a few unlucky ones pitchpoled. Super viewing for us!
From Rick Bliss:...........Today the racing started with 16-18 kts of wind out of a heading of 30 degrees. I'm approximating the wind speed. It was pretty cold on the ride out to the weather mark. I was assisting there because the photographers were going up in a helicopter. A windward leeward course through a gate then windward and back through the gate witha reach to the finish. The finish line boat was now a big catamaran since the racers had hit the previous yacht twice and the owner probably had had enough. Blair Toland's teammate Mark Herrendeen was slightly dazed when we reached him the day before after their daggerboard struck the swim platform when a competitor didn't give them room. They were back sailing with a new spinnaker pole today.
It seemed that tacking up the middle of the course was the way to go most of the day. Banging the corners proved disasterous to some top teams and their many followers. The weather mark was a great to watch the race. At times we had so much action you couldn't keep track of everything. Boats coming in on port weaving through multiple boats that were screaming in on starboard. Everyone flying around the mark and reaching off toward the offset mark sometimes three and four boats abreast. All prepping to raise their spinnakers seconds later, some raising them before the offset mark and almost capsizing or struggling hard to make the mark. The rest turning down slightly and blowing passed or being passed depending on how good they were at getting the spiinaker up and sheeted. As the day went on the sightseers got more numerous. One poor team had to round a slew of powerboats when his mainsheet wouldn't release and he couldn't turn downwind.
We had a few more instances today where people got separated from their boats and had to be scooped up by safety boats. Yesterday one of the young lady skippers had to swim to another capsized boat when her boat couldn't get righted and the safety boats were dealing with 7 capsized boats at one time. I thought I was on a fast boat until I saw one of the safety boats blazing across the water like what you see on TV with the hydrofoil racers. Okay so I exaggerate but when the driver saw the body in the water and the teammate not able to get back to him he ripped down the course later saying something about 65 mph. It was what they call a flats boat and it carried a 300hp outboard.
I was at the weather mark not the finish and things do change often on the spinnaker run so I can't give all the results but I believe Gunnar Larsen, Mike Easton, Todd Riccardi, Taylor Reiss, Cruz Smith and Bob Merrick all appeared to have a pretty good day. Lots of women competing in this event.
Was wondering how this team got an exemption:
Gunnar Larsen
Ferdinand van West
1785
Den Haag, Zuid Holland
Watersport verbond
Maybe the F18 rules should be changed so that every championship is Open?
In Europe it is normal (and encouraged!) that foreign sailors compete at each other's Nationals.
This year we had Germans, Brits, French, Belgians, the more the merrier. <img src="<>/smile.gif" alt="smile" title="smile" height="15" width="15" />
This event is open. Top finisher will win the Americas Championship, top US boat will be US National Champion. Pretty sure Europeans is open as well.
From Rick Bliss:...........Winds today are predicted to be a little lighter. It's blowing pretty good already at 8:30am. Chilly right now as they're setting up their boats but clear skies and sunny so the temp should be up around 80. The racing will be on the ocean rather than in the bay so everyone has to go through the drawbridge. The plan is to have two long openings of the bridge and hope all the boats get through in two groups before any emergency crops up where the fire dept or police need to get across the channel. Yesterday a large number of boats were late leaving the beach (very crowded at the launch area and all it takes is one slow poke in front to hold up the rest). The race committee delayed the first start. The wind and tide will push the boats down the channel to the bridge but it's going to be tough coming back in with the wind on the nose. Things are percolating around here now. Have to head out.
Fantastic reporting, and greatly appreciated by those of us who are not able to be there. Thank you!!!!