Archive for the ‘racing’ Category

Santana 22 NAs

Monday, July 15th, 2013

Raced the Santana 22 North Americans aboard Garth’s boat “Oreo”. We won the series with a 2,2,3,3,1 record. After the first day, Michael Andrews (the six-time NA champ) was in first with the very well-sailed boat “Bonito”.

There were no throwouts, so we just sailed as hard as possible the second day and had our two best races of the series. The lighter air (relatively speaking) let some other boats come up into the mix and gave us the opportunity to put some points between us and Bonito.

http://www.pressure-drop.us/forums/content.php?3661-Oreo-Claims-2013-Santana-22-Nationals

Hiking Hard Tuna 22 style

Oreo Crew

Shana in the Pac Cup

Friday, July 20th, 2012

Our intrepid bow-woman and all around chief Sancho Shana is sailing the 2012 Pacific Cup aboard Bequia, a Beneteau 411 out of Richmond YC.

http://bagleyoceanracing.blogspot.com/

http://pacificcup.org/track.html

As she put it “I finally get my own Hawaii race”.

Good luck and strong winds, Bagley. Give ’em hell Shanti style.

Shana Pac Cup 2012

Kaneohe or bust!

Cancelled Coastal Cup

Wednesday, June 6th, 2012

Brief update. Decided to DNF our Coastal Cup. Not enough total time offshore under spinnaker at night  for a good and safe time to be had by all.

Hey, next year it’s to Catalina!

Spinnaker Cup

Wednesday, May 30th, 2012

We raced the the Spinnaker Cup from SF Bay to Monterey. Classic West Coast offshore race that I’ve never done before. A couple new crew (thanks Jonathan, Marcus) and a bunch of old Shanti / Quixote hands (Bagley, John Saul, and Garth).

Totally dead at the start, followed by the usual flukey wind up through Yellow Bluff, honking out the gate with incredible flood current, blowing 27-30 minimum out the shipping channel to Buoy #6, left turn to a close reach, and spinnaker up off Pt. Montara.

Finished around 1AM for a total time of 13 hours 45 minutes, beating Bequia over the line by 90 seconds under a tight spinnaker reach (in the middle of the night through Monterey Harbor).

Second across the line and corrected down to 6th.  Results here.

Trip back was smooth, autopilot on and motored up the coast about 2 miles off the beach the whole way. Left at 6PM, docked in Sausalito about 10AM for a frosty beverage.

Quixote Spinnaker Cup

Tacking up to the North Tower

2010 J/30 NA – 2nd overall

Sunday, August 8th, 2010

A late-posted update from the 2010 J/30 North American Championships. Though we took 1st two years in a row, team Fuzzy Wuzzy came in second following a well-sailed regatta by Steve Buzbee’s Blue Meanie.

Pl B# Boat Skipper 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Tot
1 17 Blue Meanie Stephen Buzbee 1 2 1 1 (7) 1 5 11
2 11 Fuzzy Wuzzy Bengt Johansson 4 1 (6) 2 1 2 3 13
3 10 Arabella Bill Saltonstall 2 (5) 3 4 3 3 2 17
4 3 Smiles John McArthur 9 4 2 3 (11) 4 6 28
5 16 Jeraboam Ken Deyett 5 (12) 5 6 9 11 1 3

 

 

 

 

 

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j/30 NA write-up

Monday, January 4th, 2010

From Bengt:

Happy New Year!

Jon and Kelly, your article from the NA’s have gotten a lot good press: http://j30.us/blog/?p=529#more-529.

j/30 North Americans 2009

Sunday, October 4th, 2009

Just back from sailing as foredeck at the 2009 j/30 North American championships in Westport Connecticut. For the second year in a row, we took 1st in the championship. This year we sailed the 5 race series in varied (mostly light) conditions to a (2), 1, 1, 2, 1 record. Which makes us 2-time North American champions, apparently…

We also won the best amatuer crew trophy, which is always a nice addition when there are pros on the course in other boats.

Of course the credit goes to Bengt, the owner-driver who prepped the boat (holy cow untouchable upwind speed), got the crew together (6-out-of-7 owner/skippers aboard), and drove a flawless race (4-for-5 nailing the starts).

What a great crew.

Everyone here is talking about shrinkwrapping their boats for the winter—making me very happy about our 12 month California sailing calendar!

Team
Team Fuzzy Wuzzy

Tactical computer
FW Tactical Computer

Tactics, helm, trim
Tactics, Helm, Trim 2

Olson 911 owners slumming
Who let the O911 sailors into this club?!

j/105 midwinters

Saturday, February 14th, 2009

Raced in the j/105 February midwinter regatta with Racer X. Had some great Peruvian food in the city afterward with Phillip and Nicole.

Jack Frost Midwinters

Saturday, November 15th, 2008

Sailed Encinal’s Jack Frost midwinters in Berkely Circle double-handed with Bob (it’s a fully crewed series, we are just being smart asses). Very light air, which was probably good, since we were a little out of practice on the controlled chaos of short-handed racing.

DNF’d the first race, ostensibly to fix our #1 Jib for the next go-round. 2nd in the next race, losing to a Tartan 10.

 http://www.encinal.org/pageResource/racing/2009/docs/JF_2008_SSR2.htm 

This is supposed to be the series with 5 or 6 911s on the starting line, but it was just us and Elusive, both from SFYC. I like the two-short-race format, however.

Great Pumpkin Pursuit

Tuesday, October 28th, 2008

Raced the Great Pumpkin with Phillip, Nicole, Garth, and a few others aboard the j/105 Racer X. The Sunday Pursuit race, which goes  either way around Alcatraz and Angel island.

http://www.regattanetwork.com/clubmgmt/applet_regatta_results.php?regatta_id=1966  

  • Finish: Thirtieth out of one hundred sixty four (164) finishers, 195 registered
  • Wind Angel Island @ Fort Blunt: 20 knots, 25-30 knot gusts (National Weather Service)
  • Max Ebb at Alcatraz 14:45 hrs, 2.4 knots.

Phillip must have really needed crew, because he told me I could take any position I wanted if I came out. Of course, I picked tactics, figuring that all I needed for that job was a stogie, a Mt. Gay hat, and the ability to bellow “RIGHTS!” at every boat within hailing distance.

Since the wind picked up to the usual washing machine near Alcatraz, I was calling “tactics” from the bow, with boots full of water, switching the akite hoist to starboard.

Racer X Great Pumpkin

Racer X Great Pumpkin

photo credit: George Gurrola

Ultimiately, the most important tactics were:

  1. Go clockwise, choosing favorable wind (at the beginning of the race) over adverse current (coming through Racoon Straits at the end of the race).
  2. Stay way out of the Angel Island wind shadow coming out of Racoon, but not so far North that you miss the fill-in on the way back to Richmond.

Among the competitors were Far, Far (the Cal 40 that crushed our fleet in the Transpac) and Silkeye, one of those Wylie 30’s that always seem to stroll around the course (like the dbl-handed Farrallones) without spilling the skipper’s drink.