(San Francisco, CA)- The famous full-crewed Farallones Islands Race will
be taking place this weekend. The 58nm course goes from inside San
Francisco Bay, out around the Farallones Island to port and back to the
finish line on the San Francisco city waterfront. The race is
notoriously tough if there is any breeze whistling down the Pacific
coast outside the Golden Gate Bridge. It can be exhilarating as well,
producing a fast reach on starboard tack out across the infamous Potato
Patch (a shoal outside the Bay that can produce massive breaking waves),
around the Farallones, and a fast port tack spinnaker reach on a
full-on plane (for some boats) on the return to the Bay that gets you
back to the bar to enjoy the fabulous sunset shining through the Bridge.
This year there are seventy keelboat teams participating, fifteen of which are J/crews (21% of the fleet)! There is a great doublehanded fleet registered. In the twelve-boat Doublehanded Class are Mario Wijtman’s J/105 J-TRIPPER, Sean Mulvihill’s JAMANI, Richard Leute’s J/44 ACEY DEUCY, two J/88s (Jim Hopp’s WHITE SHADOW, Chris Cartwright’s VENTUS), and David Morris’ J/90 RAGTIME.
The biggest class is the thirty-boat PHRF 1 Class that includes two J/105s (Bill Woodruff’s RUSSIAN ROULETTE and Doug Bailey’s AKULA), Jim Goldberg’s J/109 JUNKYARD DOG, two J/120s (Tracy Rogers HOKULANI, Timo Bruck’s TWIST), Graham Ellis’ J/124 ALBION, and Rich Pipkin’s J/125 CAN’T TOUCH THIS.
The twenty—boat PHRF 2 Class includes Jenny Thompson’s J/30 FRICTION LOSS and Tom Borgstrom’s J/92 HIJINKS. For more Farallones Race sailing information Add to Flipboard Magazine.
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