Floatline - Chesapeake Bay News

February 2008 SpinSheet is on the Docks

There are more sailing seminars in the month of February than there are days in the month, and the new SpinSheet Calendar, also available at spinsheet.com, is packed with ideas for getting out and about in this chilly month.

The new issue features the stories of sweethearts who met sailing on the Bay, a section on getting kids into the sport, some thoughts on sailing in Antigua and Barbuda, and a Bay People profile of Gunston sailing team coach Ben Armiger. Lightning sailor Allan Terhune is the subject of this month’s APS profile, and Editor-at-Large Dave Gendell provides on-the-scene coverage of the unpredictable 2008 edition of Acura Key West Race Week. An update on Annapolis City Dock renovations and Jack Hornor’s used boat review of the Pretorien 35 are in the mix.

As usual, the back section of the magazine is packed with hundreds of used boats for sale from individuals and from the region's leading brokerages. These listings are also available at spinsheet.com.

Every issue of SpinSheet is distributed at more than 750 carefully-chosen and closely-monitored locations throughout the mid-Atlantic.The February 2008 issue will also be distributed along with its racy sister PropTalk at the Washington Boat Show over President’s Day weekend, February 14-19.

Cover shot by Dave Dunigan

IC or Icy?

Eighty sailors--half of them from the Annapolis area, the rest from New York and Massachusetts--raced in the IC Midwinter Regatta held out of Severn SA last weekend in increasingly pleasant and breezy conditions, for January, that is.

The 11.6-foot InterClub dinghy was designed for the Larchmont YC as a frostbite class more than 50 years ago. Larchmont still breeds more IC sailors than other east coast locations with 6o registered boats; Annapolis has about 20 boats. With 315 pounds being the upper limit of weight on board, "You don't see any big Star sailors out here," says Annapolis fleet captain Ian Mutnick. As a result, the class is couple- and family-friendly. Combine that notion with the fact that the boats are only sailed in winter, and you have an eclectic fleet that enjoys soup-eating and beer-drinking together by the fire as much as they do competition.

"The fun factor was the reason I did this event, and I wasn't disappointed," says Annapolis sailor Brian Bissell (left), who placed second along with his A-Team crew Alexis Rubin and B-Team Matt and Lori Schubert. A California guy at heart, Bissell swore that after college, he'd never sail in cold weather again, but when he heard how much fun the IC Midwinter event was, he went out and bought the warmest hat he could find, "even if it looked dorky or girly."

Results of the 2008 IC Midwinters are posted on the class website. Stay tuned to SpinSheet for more.

Sailing photos by Christina Hammock                              

Hat Guy by Molly Winans/SpinSheet

Just Dreamin'

Saturday, January 26 was a record-breaking attendance day at the four-day Baltimore Boat Show and SailFest. In addition to the regular boat-boarding and booth-browsing that goes on in all shows, this one had some fun surprises: a remote-controlled powerboat docking contest, a deep sea fishing simulator (one of the SpinSheet staff deftly reeled in a virtual marlin), remote-controlled sailboat racing, a fish tank for catching real fish, a casting contest, video games (including the one where you play guitar like a rock star), back and neck massages, and a live bikini-clad model giving away prizes next to a large, inflatable gecko and one of the fastest boats in the world. What more can you ask for on a Saturday in January?

The SpinSheet and PropTalk staff was there in full force, proving by our shrinking pile of SpinSheets that there were more sailors at this traditionally power-driven show than anticipated--a great sign and indicator that the sail component should grow next year. 

Oh yeah--people bought boats! Gratitude Yachting Center sold a 46-foot Island Packet cruising sailboat worth $722,000, and many other dealers reported surprisingly good sales in spite of predictions of gloomier weather last weekend in the convention center sky. A good omen? We'll buy it!

One PropTalk reader told us, "This show is the first harbinger of spring." His friend added, "A dose of medicine in this cold weather." We asked a SpinSheet reader what he was doing at the show. "Just dreamin'," he said and walked away with a beer in one hand, a bag of pretty brochures in the other.

Baltimore Boat Show was produced by the National Marine Manufacturers Association

M.W.

Baltimore Boat Show Shows Strength

While the hard-core racers were in Key West, the balance of the mid-Atlantic crowd was engaged in the Baltimore Boat Show which for the first time included a special 25,000 square foot Sailfest section and was condensed to four days (as opposed to nine days in previous years). The Show featured all 300,000 square feet of exhibition space at the Baltimore Convention Center and included more than 700 powerboats, sailboats, and personal watercraft. The formula appears to have worked.

Event organizers reported this morning that the January 23-27 event recorded record-breaking attendance while exhibitors reported their strongest sales in over a decade. The SpinSheet and PropTalk team were distributing magazines throughout the Show and agreed with the positive assessment.

Total attendance for the five-day Show was 21,544, a six-percent increase over the total attendance for the nine-day 2007 show. Saturday, January 26 was the highest single-day attendance in the Show’s 54-year history. Attendance on each day was at least double the attendance for the same day of the 2007 Show.

According to organizers, boat sales at the Show were strong and exceeded exhibitor expectations. Skip Bennett of Hartley Marine was among the impressed exhibitors. He reports, “The show was huge for us. The place was packed, and we needed more sales people. We sold more boats in a single day than any other single day in the past 10 years.”

Among the largest boats sold at the Baltimore Boat Show was a 46-foot Island Packet 465 offered by Gratitude Yachting Center. The $722,000 sale capped “A show that has exceeded our expectations in terms of crowd volume, quality of buyers, and sales,” says Gratitude Yachting Center’s Founder and President Ed Kurowski. “People are telling us that now’s the time to buy the boat of their dreams.”

Pauline Kulaj, Mid-Atlantic Event Manager for Marine Max, which had 14 boats on display in its 7000 square foot exhibit space, says, “The Show has been awesome. We sold more boats this year in five-days than we sold last year in the nine-day show.”

Baltimore Boat Show Website

Key West Follow-Up

Left: An outstanding look at Friday's breezy and thrilling racing in the Farr 40 class at Acura Key West. Barking Mad, eventual winner of the class and the Acura Boat of the Week Trophy, is seen making a clean get-away in the upper left corner.

Photo by Tim Wilkes via Premiere Racing.

We held the deadline of the February 2008 issue of SpinSheet to include a Chesapeake-biased report and results listing as well as some nice images from Maryland-based photog Ken Stanek.

A preview of the SpinSheet coverage follows: 

Acura Key West Race Week is always an event of superlatives and the 2008 edition, held January 21-25, was no exception. Although overall entry numbers are down a bit—blame the lukewarm U.S. economy or the hefty expenses associated with a Key West push for that—the event stands alone as not only America’s premier winter regatta but as the best regatta in the U.S. Period. A strong Euro and a gap in the grand prix schedule brought an influx of European boats and sailor to Key West 2008 where they joined thousands of talented American sailors and a strong force of race committee and race management experts put together by event organizers Premiere Racing.

When more than 260 boats, a legion of fired-up sailors, and a galaxy of rock stars gather in one of the coolest venues on the planet, the event typically launches smoothly and clips ahead under the expert leadership of Premiere team. Usually. But the aforementioned 2008 superlatives got launched more than 24 hours before the racing was scheduled to begin. A powerful cold front punched through the Florida Keys and across the nearby Gulf Stream and led to 30 to 35 knots of gray northerly on Opening Day. The day was abandoned in light of the conditions. Already behind on their ambitious 10-race schedule, Premiere’s team cracked off three fast races in a 10 to 17 knot easterly with on and off rain showers. Tuesday marked the first three race day in the event’s 21-year history.

Wednesday brought sunny, warm, humid, and windless conditions and the day was abandoned... The breeze finally came back mid-day Thursday and, after a morning shoreside delay, the race committee pushed back the event’s social activities and kept the sailors on the water for two short, sharp races in a building northerly.

Friday brought more northerly, up to 24 knots of it, and the circus started up an hour earlier than usual. Never before had more than a single contest been run on Closing Day but three were sailed in 2008. A total of five breezy races were finished in less than 24 hours leaving the assembled sailors exhilarated and exhausted but with eight races completed.

Premiere Racing honcho Peter Craig, who has been event director for the past 15 years, was pleased the action-packed final days transformed the regatta into a rousing success.

“I think the sailors tend to forget what happened early in the week and remember what happened at the end. We did well in that regard because the racing the last two days was outstanding,” he said.

-DSG

Bonus: A fun video of the Barking Mad team receiving their Boat of the Week trophy has been posted to GoogleVideos by the Sailing Anarchy team. (Be advised: F-Bomb at the 58 second mark.) I was on the flight out as this was happening and missed the presentation. Damn...

Wow! What a Friday!

Farr 40s at Acura Key West 2008 including Rod Jabin's Annapolis-based Ramrod.
Photo by Ken Stanek  

Key West -- OK, cutting to the chase: We won our class. We won in the closest possible way. We won be coming out on top of a tie-breaker. We won only after sailing a solid final race and taking the bullet.

I am in the Key West airport. Still pretty sore. Very fired up. More than a little bummed out by this flight schedule because I am leaving so soon after winning and it's going to be a fun night for our team. After the way this week has unfolded I know there will be some steam to blow off.

Today was a classic. Not just for us but for the whole regatta. As previously reported, the week has been strange and challenging. Never before, in the 21 year history of Acura Key West, has there been anything other than a one-race Friday. Get 'em out there. Run 'em around the course. And get 'em in early so they can make their flights, take the boats apart, etc... This year was very different. With only five races on the score sheet heading into Closing Day, event organizers sent us out into the 15 to 22 knot northerly an hour early. And they pushed us through three very solid races. That's right. Three. On Friday... We sailed two four-legged courses featuring 2.0 mile legs and then a five legger with the same distance.

After eight straight days of focused sailing, tomorrow is a rest day and I will work on a more detailed report (and some photos, I promise). Stay tuned.

-DSG

Premiere Racing's Results and Reports page.

Premiere Racing's Photo page.

Jobson Sailing (Daily Videos)

Thursday: Strange Start-Strong Finish

Key West--Today was a strange day, even by the altered standards of this weird weather week at Acura Key West 2008. We were held ashore until noon and then released to flat water, no wind, and gloom. Around 2 p.m. a forecast northerly began to fill in under clearing skies. The breeze built up to 14 knots in the gusts and provided excellent racing conditions. The water stayed flat with only a short fetch from the north and we completed two very solid contests; a four legger and a five legger. Our team is on the upswing health wise (the windless layday really did help us all) and we posted a 6-1 today. We sit atop the class leaderboard heading into Friday's closing session. Darkness was closing in as we pulled into the dock and the social events have been pushed back an hour tonight.

Tomorrow's racing events have been moved up an hour by event organizers scrambling to fill out as many races as possible in light of the two "lost" days. Our team stuck around in the fading twilight this evening and "re-moded" for breezier conditions. Dock time for us is 0730 so I doubt there will be a morning report.

The whiff of Asian food is coming from the other room and I know there are some hungry sailors (a good sign considering what we have been through the past few days). We will eat and prepare for tomorrow's races--possibly as many as three!

-DSG

Thursday Gloom

Another light air morning, but with fog this time... The regatta is delayed ashore until at least noon. We are shoreside watching the horizon and watching reports from the nearby weather buoy at Sand Key. The forecast is for slight improvement this afternoon and the organizers are hoping to send us out for racing late into the day with potential to delay the evening's awards party (scheduled nightly at 6 p.m.).

Under pressure to run good races, Premiere Racing has moved up Friday morning's start times by one hour. An approaching front is supposed to being 20 to 25 knots tomorrow.

Clearly, this week has been very strange weather-wise. Years and years clipped by for KWRW with no missed days. In fact, going to the early 1990s, only a couple of days were missed due to weather. One of the many attractions of this venue were consistently "sailable" conditions. But 2008 has featured no racing on two of the last three and, potentially, three of four.  As for yesterday's situation, event organizer Peter Craig says, “The wind never reached the threshold at which we felt we could have a quality, fair race. Our race committee has certain standards and we are not going to sacrifice quality in order to just get in a race.”

-DSG

Wednesday Sunset

A look at the Wednesday sunset in Key West. So far this week we have had a day blown out on the windy end and a day blown off for light air. In between was the first three-race day in Race Week history. Just two racing days remain at Acura Key West 2008 and the forecast for Thursday points to another warm and light air day. However, another powerful front is supposed to punch through Thursday evening. Friday could be another wild one.

-DSG

Gear

After a short day on the water Wednesday we had a long afternoon ashore. It has turned hot, humid, and sunny in Key West but for several members of our crew, the welcome break meant more recovery time in the air conditioning. We all used the long break to sort out gear both on the boat and at the condo. This exercise got me thinking about our personal gear and I'd like to pass along a little inventory of what I see on our crew and on other teams I have been around in recent months.

Inner Layer: Our crew issue first layer is from Patagonia: Quick drying shorts and long sleeve silkweight Capilene t-shirts are worn under layers when it is cold or wet and as an outer layer when it is hot and sunny (such as today).

Jackets: Team jackets are also from Patagonia.

Wet Weather Gear: The team maintains sets of Musto HPX Gore Tex gear which are issued at the start of each regatta and returned at the close.

Shoes: The majority of the team wears SLAM sailing shoes (left) although a few wear similar looking shoes from different manufacturers. The majority of the sailors wear flip-flops to the boat and carry their sailing shoes in their backpack. All brands of flip-flops are spotted although I prefer those from Olukai--spendy but worth it.

Socks: Socks are a weak spot and I would love to learn about alternatives. Most of the team wears white low-cut cotton sport socks which, of course, are immediately wet and slow drying. It is frustrating to have such great material and though go into in every stitch of gear but wet nasty socks on the feet.

Sunglasses: The majority of the team wears Kaenon sunglasses although Dirty Dogs and Oakleys are also represented.

Hats: Seven of the 10 on our boat sail with baseball caps.

Backpacks: We carry our stuff in team-issued Dakine backpacks which are checked into the dockbox before racing and do not come onto the water.

To drink: I am seeing a lot of Vitamin Water being consumed on our boat and elsewhere. And, of course, there is plenty of good old bottled water throughout the day. (NO SHARING BOTTLES!)

-DSG