FLEET 86 2006 SCOWBLOG

2006 SCOWBLOG WRAP-UP

Our first year of scow sailing is history.  What a fantastic year it was.  Thanks to John Holmes for bringing this fantastic boat to CYC.  From John's first boat, we have grown to a respectable fleet of five.  Let's keep it going.

Look at the balance our year had.  John won the club championship.  Jim won the summer series.  Bill had the best score at nationals.  Ron won the fall series.  With his new boat, Tom clearly established himself as the boat to beat by the end of the fall series.

Ron Wright
Scowblogger

2006 CYC Fall Series

The 2006 CYC Fall Series ended on December 2.  After 18 races that started back on August 26, Ron Wright emerged as the winner followed by Tom Martin, and Jim Higgins.  The series was in doubt right up to the last race day. 

December started with Ron holding a modest lead over Jim and Tom.  While Tom won the day, Ron managed to stay ahead of Jim and finish with the overall lead.

Ron explained his win thusly.  "I had two goals.  Get out of the light summer winds still in contention and then do my best when the fall winds truly kicked in by late September."

Jim Higgins took momentum from dominating the summer series by winning five of the first six races in August and September.   Ron stayed close with four deuces and one ace.

Ron moved into first place on September 23 when he won 4 out of 4 races with three other boats contending. 

Tom made a serious challenge the last three race dates.  He posted a 1-2 in 307 on Oct 7.  Then with our new boats on hand, he won five of the last six races.  Ron won the two races Tom didn't, and perhaps more important,  finished no lower than second in any other race.

When numbers were crunched, Ron finished with a 21, Tom finished at 24.1, and Jim ended with 27. 

2006 MC Scow National Championships

Can you say excited?  Four new boats!  An entire fleet all going together to their first MC Nationals?  Yes, we were excited.

We started moving boats up to Lake Norman Sunday after the CYC scowfest.  It would be a week of interesting logistics.  Our new boats were arriving at Norman on Monday night.  Ron chartered out 1370.  Bill and Tom would not take delivery until after the regatta, so they needed to take 1247 and 307 to Norman.  By the time Ron arrived on Wednesday night, every boat was on the grounds that we needed. 

We missed Jim.  Work called at the last minute.  His new boat sat on a trailer through Sunday, when Ron and John broke it down for transport to CYC.  

Thursday morning, we all saddled up for the first day of racing.  Winds were light, but out we went.  A great call.  It filled in nicely and the racing was 50/50 hiking and sitting on the leeward bow.

87 boats registered.  85 sailed out to race.  The line was so long, they put a boat in the middle to assist with OCS calls.  After one general recall, we were off.  Thinking back on it, it wasn't too pretty.  Ron and Tom were over early.  They had to re-round.  Well, our expectations weren't too high.  We just sailed hard.  Ron and Tom made up some ground and finished 62 and 65.  Not bad.  It was really quite a sight to see - 85 boats. 

And that's pretty much how it went over the next three days.  There were seven races.  For various reasons, we all sailed between 3 and 5 races.  Day two was grueling.  It rained and rained.  But there was wind and it was good hiking breeze.  After two races, we went in for lunch.  The RC sent us back out after lunch, but only Bill went back out.  In fact, Bill was the iron man.  He was the only one of us to complete six races.  On Saturday, the rain was gone, but the winds were way up.  Ron and John sailed back in immediately.  Tom and Bill raced one and came back in. 

Bill Schiffli showed that to win you have to persevere.  Bill sailed more races than any of us.  In the final analysis, it paid off.  His combined 426 was the best score of all CYC racers.  Congratulations Bill.

Here is a list of our memories:

• Tom pushes Jamie Kimball over in race 1. Bye-bye national championship!
• Ron tacks on 2322 and "rubs paint" - yikes and a 720.
• Bill goes swimming. Did anyone else?
• Where's Higgy? And does he want this new boat or not?
• Some guy who sells rescue boats thought he was gonna make some noise on the table - Ron and Tom sent him packin.
• Tom gets trapped at a leeward gate - "You have no rights.." is heard loudly...
• "RC, this is mark 1." The last boat around is....
• How many cars can get stuck in the mud?
• Tom hits three HRs (John claims it was two) and wins the MC World Series.
• John:  "Ron, Tom is pulled over at the corner church..."
• Ron:  "Tom, call Susan to call Bill's wife to call Bill to call you to tell Bill to use the gantry winch to unload 1247." Tom: "He just launched it at the docks." DUH!
• John gets lost in race 3 and finishes a leg early. Scores a 29!!!! (He e-mailed the race committee and is awaiting his punishment)!
• That hot shower on Friday, race 4, sure felt good to Holmes, the lost boy.
• Race committee where is #2021? 2021, 2021, 2021, 2021.............
• John terrorizes Tom as he tries to lock him in the bed of his PU truck as he slept which Ron dubbed  "The Cask of Amontillado."
• Bill, "pissed over not winning" drops a mast on his competitor's boat barely missing the skipper.
• We all nearly drown while staying IN our boats on Friday.
• LNYC put on an impressive volunteer effort. Except for subs one afternoon everything was prepared by their member/ volunteers. They  showed the importance of leveraging off non-participant volunteers.

2006 CYC/MBW Fall Regatta

Catawba Yacht Club hosted a first-ever MC Scow regatta on October 20-21.  Officially titled the 2006 M17/MC Scow Fall Championship, we all just called it "Scowfest".  It turned out to be a great day of sailing on Saturday as the breezes blew to hiking levels all day long.  PRO Jim Condon got in five great races.  Peter Toumanoff from Peawaukie Yacht Club in Wisconsin won the day.  Peter would go on to finish seventh in at the MC Nationals the following weekend.   He also won the the Master's National Championship by one point over Tommy Harken of Charleston.  Ron put up the highest score of of Fleet 86 - tenth place out of 16 boats. 

The Saturday party was a hit as Larry Doherty of "Jessica Says No" entertained.  "Grill on Wheels" fixed a great Southern BBQ dinner. 

Sunday brought rain and zero wind.  No sailing.  It was okay.  Saturday was such a great day, we could all live with it.   

2006 Lake Norman Labor Day Regatta

We all packed up for the first "full fleet" road trip to the Lake Norman Labor Day Regatta on Saturday, Sept. 2.  We hesitated at the club over the possibility of light air, but did finally all decided to give it a try.  Quite a site - five MCs on convoy up I-77! 

Were we ever glad we went!  The winds filled in nicely and when the first gun sounded we had windward hiking breeze all day.  Ron got a great lead in race one and then sailed right by the mark.  [Lesson:  read SIs.]  From there, Jim Higgins and Tom Martin put up the best overall scores for the Catawba Scowmen.  Bottom line at this regatta was we did not embarrass ourselves and we got in a great day of racing.

Jim and John passed on Sunday which turned out to be a great move as the wind did not arrive this day and Sunday racing was cancelled.

Overall Results

2006 CYC Summer Series

The 2006 summer series belonged to Jim Higgins.   Jim put an amazing final score of 27 that included an amazing 17 aces.  The series was sailed in very light air and by summer's end the scowmen had become pretty competent at light air sailing.

2006 CYC Open
Charleston, SC
July 29-30, 2006

Ouch!  One word sums up the weekend Ron Wright had in Charleston.   Traveling solo to the regatta, Ron arrived Saturday morning at the Carolina Yacht Club on the battery in Charleston - arguably the most beautiful sailing setting in America.  He was greeted with heavy winds.  Ron described the breeze this way:  "It was not blowing as hard as the Rebel Rouser, but it was blowing hard.  My guess would be 16-18 with occasional gusts over 20.   I was checking my tuning settings in the parking lot, and I had to turn the boat into the wind to measure side to side.  The wind was strong enough to bend the mast. "

Having sailed here in a Lightning, Ron was very apprehensive about launching.  The club had added beautiful new docks, but there was still very little room to maneuver after coming off the hoist.  His boat got away from the hoist crew and almost blew into the crane.  Safely into the water it was time to shove off.  Ron carefully hoisted sail and pushed off.  The wind filled his sail.  The main sheet tangled in the cleat and the boom could not open.  To make matters worse, both boards were up.  The wind quickly sent 1370 sideways into the seawall rocks.  Ron heard a loud crack and knew he was in trouble.  He paddled to the dock where an inspection revealed a small crack in the hull.  Ron explained the rest.  "I decided to risk sailing.  I couldn't see through the crack to the inside of the boat.  I quickly cleared the club, and was greeted by the heavy wind and harbor waves.  Truthfully, just sailing out was a challenge.  I buried the nose four times.  This just wasn't fun and my mind was on the crack.  Finally, I just decided to head back in."  Ron packed up and left without sailing a single race.

Back in Clover, the story got better.  The crack was smaller than a golf ball.  Ron turned the boat upside down on the trailer and went to work with marine tec.  Five days later, the boat was back at CYC ready to race.

2006 Low Country Regatta
June 23-25
Beaufort, SC

John Holmes, Jim Higgins, and Ron Wright traveled to Beaufort for the Low-Country Regatta on June 23-25.  John and Ron and been there several times to race Lightnings so we new what to expect.  First, Beaufort is Beaufort is beautiful.  With access to a three bedroom home over looking a tributary of the Beaufort River our accommodations were very comfortable.  After enduring awful traffic down I77-26-and 95 [we saw five wrecks], we met our old Lightning buds John Pelosi, Clay Rumble and Harold at the club and after dropping our boats, headed into town for dinner at our favorite restaurant, "Pianinis".  We enjoyed a great meal and fellowship.  Katherine Holmes and Carol Pelosi made the trip and added to our evening.  With dinner over, the Lightning gang headed for bed while the scowmen moved next door for live music.  The two piece band featured an exceptional guitar player whose rendition of "All Along The Watchtower" was quite good.

Saturday found us at the club with racing on our minds.  We set up our scows.  It was great to meet the other scowmen.  Dick Mayne, Frank Pontius, George Scarborough, and Charlie Lafitte all said hi and chatted with us.

By 11:30 it was time to go.  John and Jim opted for ramp launching.  Ron chose the hoist.  Neither was very convenient.  The ramp had no docks.  Neither did the hoist.  By noon we were underway contemplating the races.  This was a SAYRA regatta.  There would be six classes consisting of some 50 boats on our course alone.  We would go off second on a rolling start behind the dreaded Sea Island One Designs.   To make matters tougher, the wind was blowing across the Beaufort River.  We would run short WL three lap courses.  It was barrel racing, plain and simple, on a very congested race course, with considerable current.

In race one, John got an exceptional start and was competitive right away.  Ron and Jim were not as lucky and had to settle for second row.  John held on and posted a trey.  Ron climbed out of the cellar for a 4 while Jim took a 7.  In race 2, Ron got a great start and was in the top 4 heading for the windward mark.  He panicked when a port SIOD was closing in with no sign of yielding.  Ron tacked away without looking into the path of an approaching MC.   He headed off but didn't release his mainsheet and a puff drove him over.  It put Ron out for the remainder of that race and the next one.  John had been OCS and was trying to catch up following a return to the starting area.  Jim sailed his best race for a 5. 

From there, it didn't really improve.   In race three, Jim and John finished 7-8.  Ron returned for race 4 and the CYC scowmen finished 7-8-9.  At days end, Jim had been the most consistent and was in seventh followed by Ron and John.  In all fairness to John, his best race of the day was thrown out via an OCS. 

In Beaufort, the racing is always second to the social scene.  The BYSC is famous for excellent live music and Saturday night was no different.  "Triple Lindey" entertained us from 7-11.  We hung on to every song and yakked with friends between sets.  When the band finished, we headed back to the house.  Ron and Jim made a run for McDonald's and we closed the evening out on the porch eating burgers and weighing the day.

On Sunday, we woke to a steady rain.  This day was shot.  We headed to the club with intentions of packing up.  We weren't alone and despite a delay until 1 PM, most sailors were packing up.  We learned later from the results that BYSC eventually cancelled the day. 

We drove home in awful rain and traffic.  Jim phoned back from Columbia that a major wreck had slowed traffic to a crawl.  Katherine checked the maps leading Ron and John to detour around Columbia on two lane back roads.  Jim eventually reported that @ten cars were involved in the I-26 wreck including a tractor trailer that appeared to have run over a small car.  Ugh!

By late afternoon we were all safe and sound at home.   

Results

2006 CYC Spring Series

The first CYC scow series is in the books - well at least the informal books.  We were barely a fleet and CYC did not extract our scores from the regular Spring gold series results.  Ron kept them for us on an excel spread sheet.

The final results showed that Ron won with a low score of 29.  Jim was next with 36 followed by John [44] and Bill [56]. 

Jim was the fastest sailor.  He won more races than anyone [6].  John won the club championship. 

Ron explained the series this way..  "With my weight, I had to do well before the light air of summer got here.  On the first day of the series, when the winds were strong, I put up three aces.  I didn't sail on March 19 and Jim dominated March 26.  April 9 was probably my best day.  With five boats on the water, I finished 2-2-1 to win the day by 2 points.  John was Mr. Consistent to win the club championship on April 22 going 2-2-2-1. May 28 belonged to Bill Schiffli as he sailed 2-3-1.   By June 4, I was in pretty good shape.  With only Jim and I racing, I could finish second in all three races and still win.  I finished 2-1-1.  Jim and I had some great duels - especially in the final 2 lap race where we chased each other around every mark.  Jim went high on the last leeward leg and I went low.  It was enough for a three boat lead at the last windward mark and I hung on to win the race."

If anything, this series showed how much fun competitive racing can be.  Every scow sailor in the fleet won a race - including Tom Martin who raced 307 on April 9.  John has upped the bar with a new 2000 series boat.  Jim and Ron are looking to upgrade soon also.  We hope Tom Martin will buy an MC soon.  Ron and Jim hope to roll their old boats into new club sailors.  With a little luck, come the 2007 Spring series we will have seven boats on the line.

Ron Wright
1370/307

2006 Rebel Rouser
Lake Lanier Yacht Club
April 29-30

Fleet 86 headed for Atlanta's Lake Lanier for a weekend of racing on April 29-30.  It would be the first regional scow regatta for Ron Wright and Tom Martin.  For John Homes and Jim Higgins, it was regatta 2 as they both sailed the mid-winters in Eustis. Florida.

Ron headed down Friday night while Tom, John, and Jim caravan-ed Saturday morning.  It was a nice 3.5 hour drive.

Wind was the order of the day.  By the time the 11:30 skipper's meeting rolled around the race course was whitecappin'.   The RC announced a postponement of one hour.  That meant winds were consistently exceeding 20 - the class limit.  At 12:30 the ban was lifted and we all headed out to race.  Ron and Jim donned their mast diapers, a move that would pay off for Ron.  We also tied on sturdy righting lines.  It was still blowing very hard.

After testing the wind, Jim and John decided to pass and headed in, as did several others.  Jim found that his boards would not retract properly in the heavy air and we had been warned about sailing downwind with the boards down.  Ron and Tom lined up to race.  In the pre-start, Ron took the first of four weekend swimming trips as he dumped courtesy of a serious gust and too much heel.  The diaper did it's work and the boat simply laid in the water on its' side.  Ron tossed the righting line over, pulled for all he was worth and lo, the boat stood up.  Minutes later the horn went off and race one was under way.  Ron and Tom settled into a duel with three other boats in the back of the pack.  Ron was slightly ahead as the finish lined loomed when, bam, over again.  Ron performed the righting act successfully a second time but Tom was close enough to take advantage and crossed ahead of Ron.  The two finished 10-11 beating two other boats.

Jim came out for race two and three.  The wind eased just enough to make it bearable and we raced two more times without capsizing.  Ron kept his boat upright and led the backpackers in the remaining races.  At days end, with nineteen boats registered, Ron was in ninth and Tom was in tenth by one point.  It looked better than it was though as 15 was the largest number of boats on the course at any one time.

The party was great.  Pam Barron came to visit her Lightning buds.  We wore out the foosball table.  Ron and Jim got to jam some great bluegrass with banjo picker Dave Varnell.  Tom found a poker game. 

We rose early and put our boats in first on Sunday to get good dockspace.  The wind was steady, but not like Saturday.  It didn't take long to build.  On the race course, it was honkin' with serious chop before the first gun went off.  We hung in there and started race 4.  Jim called it off early and headed in.  Ron was leading the CYC boys to the final leeward mark.  As he rounded up to a beat, the wind knocked him down again.   For the third time, Ron righted his boat from a capsize and rejoined the race.  For the second time, Tom took advantage and passed him.   John finished this race, but the wind was the heaviest of the weekend and he headed in with Jim.  Tom followed suit.  Ron should have. 

With nothing to gain but the "LLevos Grandes" award, Ron lined up with only nine other boats for race 5.  He made it one beat and one leeward leg.  Rounding up for the second beat, Woodstock 2 took dump number 4.  Worn out after two days of fighting the wind, Ron simply didn't have the strength to right the boat in the stiff winds.  He had to take assistance, a DNF, and a tow.   Talk about "impoetic" justice!

We had a great time despite the overpowering conditions.  We are learning and we can add high wind to our list of teachers.

2006 Club Championships
April 22, 2006

On April 22, we sailed out for the first ever CYC Club Championships.  Jim Higgins, John Holmes, Ron Wright, and Bill Schiffli represented the scow fleet.   Rain was threatening, but after the 8:30 skipper's meeting it looked okay so we went out to do battle.  This was going to be Jim Higgins day.  He established a big lead in race one.  As we rounded the windward mark, the front edge of a rain squall came in and we literally all took off on a wild plane.   As we rounded the leeward mark, the RC cancelled and ran us all in for safety. 

We checked the radar and established that there were clear skies behind the brief rain and at noon, we went back out.  This time we got in four races.  Jim simply took commanding leads in the first three races and won going away.   Meanwhile, John Holmes was sailing a great series also.  While he and Ron traded positions a couple times, John came out ahead at each finish line and went to race four with three deuces.

That's when things took an interesting turn.  Ron was following Jim during pre-start and a rogue gust knocked Jim over right in front of Ron.  Ron felt his boards hit some part of Jim's rigging as he was unable to steer away.  Jim turtled and was forced to retire.  Bill also retired, so Ron and John would duel for the last race.  It wasn't a duel.  John grabbed a quick lead and dominated.  It was the ace he needed as Jim's dns cost him dearly.  With no throw-outs, John won by a point.  Congratulations Club Champ.

Scores