(Seattle, WA)- After complaining to a fellow sailor at the local sailing
club watering hole that there wasn’t a real “I sailed the most and did
the best” list of boats in the Pacific North West (PNW), his friend
responded with a mild retort, “don’t just talk the talk, walk the walk,
call a spade a spade and make it happen then. . . .dude!!” Well, that is how the PNW Intergalactic Championship was born. So, according to Ben Braden and friends in Seattle, “we put together a list of races from Olympia to Bellingham that boats travel to from one Yacht Club to another and ones that are not dominated by one design racing, nor dinghies. Each year the number of races vary from changes and cancellations due to no wind or too much wind, the number varying between 24 and 28 races each year. This year the Duwamish Head Race was left off for lack of results – it was cancelled due to too much wind! A boat’s place in class is used for the scoring, if you didn’t do the race you get 2 points more than the worst score in that particular race– no throw-outs, no weighting, no best of “x” races”, you raced it, you got it.”
Given that scenario, it’s pretty remarkable that 564 boats across the greater Seattle, Vancouver, Victoria region participated in 2014. Of that, almost 15% of them were J/Boats! And, more remarkably, of the top 25 almost 30% of them are happy, passionate members of the J/Tribe!
Obviously,
if you do the best in the most races, you win. Promoting both
participation (something sorely needed by every group out there) and
sailing well is a good thing. Back in 2011, the top spot was won by the
J/109 TANTIVY. In 2012, it once again went to the J/109 TANTIVY. For
2013, everything switched around with TANTIVY dropping back to 8th and
fellow stablemate, the J/105 LAST TANGO, taking top J/Boat honors.For the 2014 PNW Intergalactic Championship, the 2nd spot on the podium once again goes to the J/105 LAST TANGO, owned by Jim Geros, just 2 races back from first overall with 17 races and off the pace by just 15 points. Moving back up the game of “snakes & ladders” in 2014 was Stuart Burnell’s J/109 TANTIVY, taking 6th overall. Jerry Diercks’ J/105 DELIRIUM finished 10th, followed by Pat Denny’s J/29 HERE & NOW in 16th, the duo of Mayfield & Nelson on the J/29 SLICK in 20th, Jerry Woodfield’s J/109 SHADA in 23rd and, finally, Dennis Clark’s pretty pristine white J/27 LXIII in 25th.
Well done everyone and to all the race organizers in the Salish Sea, a huge “Thank You” for “Getting Out The Boats” in 2014 and helping to get over 550 different boats out racing in the PNW in 2014!
Sailing photo credits- Jan Anderson – swing on over to “http://janpix.smugmug.com” and buy your crew a picture as a “Thank You” for a great year!
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