(Harbor Springs, MI)- The most popular sailing event to attend on an
annual basis has to be Little Traverse YC’s famous “Ugotta Regatta” that
is sailed on the pristine Caribbean-blue Little Traverse Bay on the
upper northwest part of the Michigan peninsula. The regatta is host to a
J/70 fleet (popular with the local youth sailors) as well as fleets of
offshore boats sailing ORR and PHRF that have been refugees and
survivors from the two equally famous Mackinac Races that took place in
the previous three weeks (Bayview and Chicago). The regatta takes place
from July 27th to 29th and features a combination of round-the-cans as
well as random-leg courses for the fleets. Not surprisingly, the most
popular one is the “Round the Bay Race”. Sailing in the nine-boat ORR C fleet are five J’s, including Jack & Jim Toliver’s J/109 VANDA III, Geoff Brieden & Jeff Clark’s J/120 SCOUT (recent Mac Race winner), Matt Songer’s J/122 EVVAI, Bob Mampe’s J/122 GOTTA WANTA, and Bob Klairmont’s J/133 SCIROCCO 3.
There
are six J/crews sailing in the eleven-boat PHRF B fleet, including four
J/88s (Andy Graff’s EXILE, Rich Stearns’ HOKEY SMOKE, Scott & Jim
Sorbie’s LEGACY, & Ben Wilson’s RAMBLER). In addition, they will be
up against the famous long-distance cruising couple and local hotshots-
Bill & Judy Stellin- on their J/42 JAYWALKER and Gary & Susan
Stewart’s J/32 ZONE.By far the largest fleet in the regatta is the popular J/70 class, with twenty-one boats having made the trek from across the Midwest and farther; in fact, as far as Chicago, IL; Kansas City, KS; Atlanta, GA; and Larkspur, CA! Several boats should be near the top of the leaderboard, such as Sarah Renz’s BERTEAU GROUP from Chicago, IL; Bill McKinley’s DENALI 0.5 from Harbor Springs, MI; Scott Sellers’ TRES BURRITOS from Larkspur, CA; and Dick Lehmann’s WIND CZAR from Paradise Valley, AZ.
Finally, a very talented fleet of five J/111s is racing as a one-design class, including the Chicago-Mackinac Race class winner- local hero Dave Irish and his team on NO SURPRISE. In addition, attending are past J/111 Great Lakes Champions- KASHMIR (Karl Brummel, Steve Henderson, & Mike Mayer). For more LTYC Ugotta Regatta sailing information Add to Flipboard Magazine.
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