NoCal SoCal AnyCal On J/111

Join Us For 111 Calorie-Free, Adrenalin-pumping Days
(San Francisco and San Diego, CA)- Two high-octane J/111s are now sailing on the West Coast.  One in San Diego and one in San Francisco.  If you're predisposed to having a bit of fun sailing, getting your "ya ya's out" with some friends and don't mind planing or surfing for days on end with finger-tip control at 20+ knots in some SoCal offshore classics like Transpac, Ensenada, Cabo, Puerto Vallarta, then belly up to the table and get yourself and some friends or family out for a little spin.  For the Bay gang, it's all about getting uphill to turn the corner, pop the big one and go for a hugely pleasure-inducing, hootin'n'hollerin blast down the Bay past Alcatraz, just remember to get kite down before you hit Treasure Island or Berkeley!  We promise you'll have a hard time wiping the grin off your face.  If you thought the J/125s were having all the fun, think again.  For NorCal Bay fanatics, please contact Norm Davant at ph# 510-523-8500 or norman@sailcal.com.  For SoCal surfers, be sure to contact Jeff Brown at ph# 619-224-6200 or jeff@jk3yachts.com.  To get you amped before you go, watch the J/111 Nova Scotia "flat water planing" YouTube video....enjoy.   

J/35 OUTRAJEOUS Gets New Lease on Life!

"Skip" Baldwin from England bought an old J/35 they found living a life of benign neglect in Liverpool and resurrected it- it is a VERY amusing story (about as good, if not more remarkable than the J/30 RAFIKI story).  And, one that ANY boat owner can empathize with.  You can read about their travails of really living the "phoenix from the ashes" experience on their website.  Here's an excerpt of their first major event this past year.  As Skip explains- "Bank Holiday weekend, we decided to sail "The Bank of England Regatta", how appropriate.  It was all smiles in the land of OUTRAJEOUS as the midweek forecast read sun and warm winds from the south west 10-15 mph.  Fantastic we thought, ideal conditions for our first regatta of the season, weather to break us in to the new season gently.  Oh how wrong we were....

In our first race, the winds continued to build...this was "Gucci sailing".  The boats now in view were boats that had started 45 minutes in front of us.  Looking at the anemometer the wind was now 30-35 knots (that to the non-seafaring readers out there, means it was blowing dogs off chains!) the kite was full to bursting and we were on fire - 9 knots, 10 knots (Samantha Mumba's), 11 knots, 12 knots finally topping out at 13.7 knots... YAHOOOOOO!!!!  The old Girl was smoking..the mark was approaching quickly, very very quickly in fact and the wind was constantly shifting 20-25 degrees, now all we need to do is get the kite down, simple?  Well maybe not so simple, the wind shifted and we broached violently, the 30+ knot winds pinning us to the sea, the guy got wrapped around a window catch so could not be released, the halyard too had jammed, we were nailed to the Solent harder than cheap shuttering to a broken window... Moments before this, Skip in his infinite wisdom had gone to steer from the leeward side, better vision into the mark, great!  Unfortunately the leeward side by now was underwater, along with him.. eventually the kite exploded and we were able to haul in the shattered remains..."   Read more about OUTRAJEOUS's tales of delight and disaster, for anyone who's ever owned a used sailboat, you'll die of laughter!  I promise. :)   More outrageous sailing stories of the J/35 OUTRAJEOUS here.
  

J/80 Worlds Coffee Table Book Published

(Auckland, NZ)- Paul Todd's Outside Images is pleased to announce the publication of the J/80 World Championship 2010 Coffee Table book.  This book is a memento to sailors and everyone involved with the J/80 World Championship held in Newport, Rhode Island October 2010. There are over 200 images through out the book and each chapter relives some of the awesome sailing and how close the regatta was between the American and Spanish teams.

The book will make a great holiday gift for crew and skippers alike, it opens to extraordinary double page spreads that are 26 inches wide.  This book will look great just sitting on the table for everyone to browse through and get a real taste for the action that played out in Newport between the teams and crew.  Take a sneak peek and place your order for the book.  Your family and friends who love sailing will love you even more for such a thoughtful gift!    View the J/80 Worlds Coffee Table  Book here.

Also you can order any images in the book as prints or digital downloads or any image taken at the regatta.  There is also coupon offers for 3 or more images 25% off ( J80worlds3 ) and for 5 or more 40% off ( J80worlds5 )  It can be applied at the "checkout" stage of purchasing prints or digital downloads at www.outsideimages.com.  There are over 500 high-resolution images on the web site.

Follow links to see images from each day's racing:   Day 1     Day 2      Day 3    Day 4   

J/122s Win IRC East Coasts

The PUG, JENNY Go PLUM CRAZY, Too!

Annapolis, MD (October 30-31) - "The breeze was fantastic," said Regatta Chair Dick Neville, "more like San Francisco than Annapolis at this time of year."  Dominating the regatta was the J/122 PUGWASH sailed by David Murphy of Westport, CT, scoring a 2.25-1-1-1-1-1 for only 7.25 points.  PUGWASH's tactician and match racing champ Ian Williams was impressed with the J/122. "It's a great boat and rates well." PUGWASH's strategist and Olympic gold medalist Kevin Burnham was extremely impressed with the team and their ability to maximize performance with their new, groovy sails. As winner of IRC Class 3, PUGWASH posted a string of five straight first-place finishes in the buoy races. In second was FLYING JENNY VI, a J/122 sailed by David Askew (Annapolis, Md.), which posted 16.25 points with a strong 2.25-3-4-2-3-2 record.  Not a bad year for FJ VI either, following on a string of firsts as she toured the Great Lakes this past summer.  Finally, not to be outdone by their sisterships, Andrew Skibo and crew on PLUM CRAZY II finished third with a 4.5-2-2-10-2-3 for 23.5 points; other than a DNS(10), PLUM CRAZY II was in the hunt for second in the no throw-out series.

In IRC Class 4, J/109 RUSH owned by Bill Sweetser (Annapolis, Md) also held a huge lead for first with about as dominating a performance as her larger sisterships in IRC Class 3.  Sweetser's RUSH scored a 1.5-3-1-1-1-1 for just 8.5 points!

The only dedicated IRC rating event on the Chesapeake, the IRC East Coast Championship was the IMS East Coast Championship before 2005.  This marks the tenth year that the championship has been organized by the Storm Trysail Club’s Chesapeake Station and the sixth year it has been run under the IRC rule. For 2011, the event will be part of the Storm Trysail Club’s Block Island Race Week presented by Rolex, scheduled for June 19-24, 2011.  Sailing photo credits: Sara Proctor  For more STC IRC East Coasts Sailing information

  

J/Benelux J-Fest Show

* J/Benelux in Lelystad, The Netherlands, held a fun J/Fest type event over the weekend of 23-24 October.  Rod Johnstone attended to help give local J enthusiasts pointers on how to have fun, sail their boats fast and give some insights to potential new J/Owners on some of the new boats in the line, like the J/95, J/97 and J/111.

In cooperation with Team HEINER (they own 8 J/109’s in their sailing company) J/Benelux organised a whole weekend with almost the whole J/Boats range of boats available where people could have a demo sail with their favorite J/Boats model!  Although the weather was cloudy with strong winds we had more then 100 people participate. At the end of the weekend, every one came off the boats with big smiles on the faces!

On Saturday the Dutch J/Club organization organised a sailing clinic with the Team HEINER instructors and, along with Rod J, helped the J sailors on their boat-handling and boat-speed techniques.  Later that evening, Roy Heiner and Rod J spoke about their mutual passion for sailing and Rod spent some time describing the history of J/Boats and the development of the latest models.  Also Rein Bakker, the founder of the Dutch J/109 one design class spoke about class development and activities for next year.  J/Benelux's Angelique Verhoef said, "It was an evening many J owners won't forget! Rod, thanks a lot for your commitment during the whole event and for skippering many different boats with everyone during the demo sails! Hope to see you again next year!

  

Harvest Moon Regatta- Texas-style!

(Galveston, TX)- Keith Magnussen of Ullman Sails filed this amusing race report from Texas:  "Every October hundreds of boats in Texas gear up for the annual Harvest Moon Regatta which is a 150 mile sprint from Galveston to Port Aransas. The regatta website claims "offwind sailing for maximum speed" and beautiful weather along the Texas Gulf Coast. I lived in Texas for over ten years and never had the time to participate in the event but this year James Liston brought me out to race on his J-120 AEOLUS.

I arrived in Houston to some pretty nice, but hot, weather, and a forecast of 15-30 kts of wind from the South-South East. Well there goes the "offwind sailing for maximum speed" scenario! The race started in less than 8-kts of wind in beautiful weather and flat seas, maybe the website was right? After struggling to get out of the bad air that 200 boats starting in front of you leave we decided to hoist the Code 0 and started to really pick off some boats. Not many people in point to point races these days have a code 0 and that is surprising because it can be such a valuable piece of inventory to have!

I knew we could only hold the 0 up to about 13kts of wind but were gaining so much ground it was hard to get my mind to switch gears. It was not until God decided to switch gears and he brought it down. The fitting on the end of the pole finally gave way we lost the tack of the sail. Kudos to the crew as we had the sail down quickly and were now jib reaching towards the Freeport Buoy.

As night started to close in on us the wind moved forward and the waves increased in size. We switched out to the blade and were now at such an awkward angle to the waves that is was making it a little difficult to drive. Waves were now continually breaking over the boat and the wind was picking up to 25+kts. This is when you really get to see the true colors of the crew. For the most part, our crew was white in the face! I finally took a nap and when I woke up a 1/3 of the crew was incapacitated with extreme sea-sickness. Made it really roomy down below as no one wanted to get off the deck for fear of catching the bug. Doesn't bother me though, I like to get out of the cold for 20 minutes and get some coffee!

Day broke and we were quickly closing in on PA and as we got closer the wave sequences increased as did the confusion of the seas. It gets really shallow and the dozens of tankers leaving the area do not help either. We rounded the PA buoy at around 11am and headed to the finish line in 30kts TWS. I took a quick glance to the horizon and saw a slew of boats behind us and knew we were in the first group of finishers. 6th monohull to finish and third place overall corrected time in ORC B.

I was exhausted and so was everyone else at this point, put it did not deter us from having some stiff drinks and a good time at the Sandcastle Condo Resort! Interesting little town and a lot different than what I was used to. Lakewood Yacht Club did a fantastic job organizing and GBCA came out in full force to support the functions. The Houston Yacht Club organized a nice shrimp boil at the Sandcastle while the Bacardi Party got set up.

Big thanks to James Liston for having me out and all the crew for the hard work on a tough regatta. Check out the Video and I look forward to the next Harvest Moon Regatta! Enjoy! Love you all! Monster man hugs (girlies, too) to all everywhere!"

  

Murrieta Wins J/24 Vela Pan-Americana

(Puerto Vallarta, Mexico- Oct 20-24)- The Copa de Naciones Vela Panamericana was organized by the Mexican Sailing Federation and hosted by Vallarta Yacht Club in conjunction with Paradise Village Marina and Resort.  It was a preparatory event for the Pan American Games in October, 2011 and for many classes will serve as eliminatory for the 2011 Games.

As always, the sailors were not disappointed with the beautiful Riviera Nayarit on Banderas Bay, an unparalleled venue for competitive sailing on the Pacific coast of Mexico.  Over the four days, eight races were sailed in winds that ranged from 12 - 20 knots during the afternoon, near perfect sailing conditions.

Like they did earlier in the year at Copa Mexico on Banderas Bay, the Mexican team of Jorge Murrieta sailing with Julian Fernandez, Bernardo Minkow and Alejandro Murrieta sailed a strong series to score 1-2-1-2-1-1-3-2 for a total of 10 points (with throw-out) to win.  Second overall was Yon Belausteguigoitia with 13 points.  Third was Ken Porter, a very good Mexican J/24 sailor from Cantiere Navale Valle de Bravo near Mexico City, finishing with 19 points.  For more Vela Pan-Americana sailing information.

  

MIRAGE Dominates J/105 East Coasts

(Annapolis, MD- Oct 30-31)- It was a great weekend to celebrate Halloween in the Chesapeake.  With the gaggle of J/24s flocking around the race course straight off the Severn River, the IRC East Coast Champ teams were off in another part of the upper Chesapeake, so the J/105s headed further south and had fun amongst themselves.  Twenty boats showed up for this event and other than the fact that Frederik Salvesen's and Cedric Lewis' MIRAGE walked off with the win, it was a real fight for the top five overall.

The MIRAGE team rattled off four 1sts after a slow start in the first race to win by only 15 points.  The battle that took place behind them wasn't settled until the final race.  Essentially four boats were tied depending on whom had good/bad races over the course of the series.  Carl and Scott Gitchell's TENACIOUS, Chris and Carolyn Groobey's JAVA, Gerrit Schulze's MAX POWER and Jim Konigsberg's INIGO were all vying for 2-5 position overall.  In the start slow, finish fast department (like the winner) was TENACIOUS.  After a 6-9, the Gitchell's managed to sail a solid series to finish with a 3-3-4 to secure 2nd with 25 points.  In the start fast/ finish slow department were the Groobey's who finished 3rd.  JAVA started with getting the gun in the first race and 3rd in the second race, but slipped to an 8-6-8 for 26 points, just one point from second.  MAX POWER started slowly and nailed a 2-2 in the last two races to finish with a flourish and 28 points for fourth.  Sailing consistently near the top to secure 5th was INIGO with 31 points.  For more J/105 Chesapeake Bay Champs sailing information.

  

J/109 WHISKEY JACK 3rd In China Cup

(Hong Kong, China)- Guy Nowell, from Sail-World Asia, filed this report from the side deck of the J/109 WHISKEY JACK during the regatta.

Team WHISKEY JACK started the day with 22 kts across the deck, and the crew all ready to get at it after yesterday’s wash-out opener to the China Cup International Regatta 2010. And then, 10 minutes before the start, a split head-foil required emergency maintenance that took rather longer than the time available. Off went the Beneteau 40.7s on a windward-leeward course, off went the HKPN and FE26 divisions, and then off went IRC Racing and Cruising. Sadly, WHISKEY JACK scored a DNS.

And so to the second race, a big circle course (15 nm) around some of the islands in Daya Bay. Big breeze to start, a beat to a windward mark, a code zero bear-away to the south east corner of the course, a beat north and then a shy spinnaker reach back to the finish – and that was when we blew out our biggest a-sail while humming downwind at 10+ kts, hanging on to the coat tails of the A35 just in front of us, and the A40 just in front of that. We ‘cruised’ home (after all, we are sailing in the IRC Cruising division) under a normaler kite – and, for the record, scored second in division. Back at the dock, and there was plenty of customers for the UK-Halsey service department.

We still haven’t worked out why the Opening Ceremony was held exactly half way through a four-day regatta, but such niceties of terminology disappeared like the skin off a mast man’s hands when competitors were bused to a local sports stadium to find a ceremony of almost Olympic (well, at least Asian Games) proportions waiting for us.

Quite evidently the China Cup has tapped into a bottomless well of money, and hoop-la is what they are spending it on. All of us who witnessed the CCIR 2007 Closing Ceremony thought it was huge – literally. But tonight’s show eclipsed it utterly, as regatta crews were ushered into a sports stadium by pom-pom waving schoolgirls, marshaled under the stands, and then paraded into the stadium, every wave and smile recorded for posterity by TV cameras, and escorted to the VIP seats.

And then the show began – with the speeches (we promised you speeches) from people in suits, including the Mayor of Shenzhen and ISAF Vice President Teresa Lara, a former recreational windsurfer and Sunfish sailor, who said some astonishingly complimentary things about CCIR event management, and a great deal more about international friendship and sportsmanship - the usual platitudes trotted out on these occasions.

A band played the Chinese anthem, the Chinese and CCIR flags were ceremonially raised, and on came the dancers, the acrobats, the fire-eaters and the drummers. There was a massed-semaphore display, and a dancer who threaded her way through the fountain jets that sprang up from the ground. Then part of the stadium flooded, and in came the jet skis. Some of us were beginning to think that the lions were next, and Caesar would be giving the thumbs-down to anyone who hadn’t done a spell on a winch today. There was a high diver who dropped from an unreasonably high crane in unreasonably shallow water (re-appearing accompanied by mermaids), and a gigantic fan-shaped fountain back-lit by a laser show. And at the end of it all a grand finale of dancing flowers, dancing birds, a local pop singer, bungee-swingers hanging off the stadium roof, giant streamers, and the giant blue bouncing balls (definitely not allowed at the Hong Kong Rugby Sevens!).

It was a huge, colorful and fantastic spectacle. It rocked the thousands of people in the stadium, and sent away a great many China Cup sailors with big smiles on their faces. After all that attention, they are excused for thinking that they are now all heroes and world class athletes when in fact they are participants in a regatta that lives more on appearance than substance, and has failed to attract a Grand Prix division at even a regional level since its first running in 2007. But this is China, where self-confidence and money are everything. Spent a lot of money, and tell everyone that you (and they) are great, and enough people will believe you.

There is an uncomfortable ‘disconnect’ between the undeniably spectacular show that we saw at the stadium tonight and the reality of a event that can muster only three boats (total) into an ‘IRC Racing’ class and lumps all the rest into IRC Cruising. It’s smoke and mirrors, a way of disguising the shortcomings of a fairly undistinguished local regatta and passing it off as a major international event.

We are not under any illusion that the show tonight was funded by the China Cup – it was an extravaganza that had ‘state-sponsored bread and circuses’ written all over it – but think of it this way: if the China Cup can afford to throw a multimillion dollar splash like they did tonight, then why do they even bother to charge regatta entry fees and sell party tickets, and why do they spend very little money on maintaining their One Design fleet (and its sails), the very fleet that they charter out to the visitors whose presence is then used to leverage the ‘international’ image of the regatta.

Tonight we all watched funds go up on smoke – or down the drain – that could have been much better applied to the improvement of the China Cup International Regatta itself.  Which, after all, is the whole point, isn’t it?

Of note, WHISKEY JACK did manager to recover, sail the rest of the series and secure a 3rd overall in IRC Cruising Class!  Also of note, Chicago Yacht Club sailors competed as one of two U.S. teams represented at the China Cup International Regatta. "Team Chicago" was led by Michael Mayer, owner and driver of the J/105, KASHMIR, and an active participant in the Rolex Big Boat Series, Key West Race Week, Chicago NOOD, the Centomiglia in Italy, and no less than 28 Chicago Yacht Club Races to Mackinac. Mayer was be joined by the following crew who've been seen recently sailing on J/111s, J/105s and J/109s on the Lakes- George and daughter Andrea Miz, Steve Henderson, kite goddess Karen Gottwald, Mike and Kate Kennedy and Mike Mayer.  At the end of the day?  They had fun!  The South Africans seemed to have their number, but that's another story to tell for another day.  For more China Cup sailing information.

  

Grey Dawn Breaking For Halloween On Hamble

The DREAM, JIKA-JIKA, OI! Continue Winning

(Hamble, England)-   In a horror scene right out of "The Zombies" (or, perhaps somewhat like Cowes Week), a pile of classes converged at a leeward mark in Sunday’s fourth round of the Garmin Hamble Winter Series, causing complete chaos (and some bodies flying overboard). While admirable rule observance ensured that every boat rounded safely, it was the bolder skippers who gained most, particularly in the highly competitive J/109 and J/80 classes.  

On this overcast but mild morning courses for the IRC and larger one-design classes were set across the Brambles Bank to suit the 10-15 knot easterly breeze that backed steadily during the day. With low water coinciding with the first starts the tide was by then running eastwards, but assisted by cautionary announcements on the VHF from Race Director Jamie Wilkinson all seven fleets got away without a general recall. The increasing tide also contributed to the bottleneck at the turning marks, where yachts in multiple classes arrived together with spinnakers set. It provided some nail-biting spectator sport. In fact, a slightly late spinnaker drop aboard ME JULIE in the J/109s saw a crew member over the side, but quickly recovered.

It was an exciting day for the eighteen J/109s competing in the series, and different players continue to show up each week to challenge the leaders.  Nevertheless, the powerful J-DREAM team (David & Kirsty Apthorp) have seriously dialed up the pressure even more on their colleagues and now have a 1-3-1-2-1-1-1-1 score for 6 points.  Lying second is OFFBEAT (David McLeman) with a 9-2-4-3-4-5-3-2 tally for 18 points.  Third four points back is OUTRAJEOUS (Richard & Valerie Griffith) with scores of 5-5-3-4-5-2-5-3 for 22 points.

Over in the IRC 3 Class, the J/97 continues to sail well with Mike and Jamie Holmes J/97 JIKA-JIKA strengthening their lead further with a 4-1-1-3-1-1-4-1 record for 8 points, they now have a 6 point cushion in this competitive 17 boat class.

John Cooper on OI! still dominating the J/80 class in the  Winter Series with a 1-1-1-3-2-2-2-2-1-3 for 14 points!  Nine points further down the ladder is second overall is Patrick Liardet on AQUA-J with a 2-4-3-5-4-3-1-1-3-2 for 23 points.  Still lying third is Gordon Craigen's SWALLOW with a 6-3-4-4-6-1-3-3-4-1 for 26 points.

With the mid-series break next weekend, the series resumes on November 14th with one race per day for the Black Group, while the sportsboats in the White Group continue their regular three race schedule.  Report contributed by Jontey Sherwill   For more Garmin Hamble Winter Series results and sailing information.