Wirth Monroe Fort Lauderdale to Palm Beach Yacht Race - Riding the Conveyor

This race is sponsored by the Sailfish Club of Palm Beach and the Lauderdale Yacht Club. Our start was at 10:05 with the wind out of the North Northeast at about 15 knots. We made the decision to sail with our ap#1 and try to stay as close to rumb as possible.

After the start

The Gulf Stream was half the strength in front of Ft. Lauderdale so it did not matter that we stayed closer to shore. However an hour in the race the wind started to go right and picked up a couple of more knots so as we got in the stream it got pretty rough. We got about a 2 knot push so in order to make good progress the crew had to endure getting wet by sitting on the rail. We got as far as 8 miles offshore to ride the conveyor. We probably went in a little early but it was enough to win PHRF overall.

Carithia sailed up to 8 miles out

The finish at the Worth Channel Inlet

Crew: Nicole Neeley, Karl Kuspa, Bob Declercq,, Fred Rozelle, Erik Ryan, Jim Dalessandro, Jim Dundas

Welcoming committee

Holding the first place award

Best buffet in South Florida

PHRF A				phrf	Class	Overall
Carinthia	J 120	Frank Kern		48	1	1
Second Wind	Dufour- Feici/Roseo 44	Ray Sullivan		69	2	2
Bandana	Oyster 48	David Wallace		93	3	4
Loki	J 105	David Bond		82	4	5
Risky Too	Hobie 33	Jens von Holten		93	5	7
Ghost	Hinckley 52	Carl L.C. Kah, Jr.		98	6	8
Garuda III	J 37C	Andy Flack/Sea Scouts		85	7	9
Rhumbline	Hobie 33	Andy Flack/Sea Scouts		93	8	12
Mostly Harmless	SR33 sloop	John Brim	DNS	66	10	18
PHRF B
E-Ticket	Beneteau Moorings 38	Rob Hutcheson		126	1	3
Sempre Amantes	Hunter Pasage 42	Colin Whittaker		120	2	6
Unicorn	Creekmore/Croff 36	Michael Peteler		187	3	10
Sara Deane	Hinckley	Don McKenna		186	4	11
Munequita	Cherubini	Charles Evans		120	5	13
Ocean Dancer	Catalina 387	Mark Stephenson	DNF	150	11	14
Tudo Bem	Lazarra 50	Maurice Hynes	DNF	138	11	15
Anticipation	Beneteau First 38	Michael Phelan	DNF	117	11	16
Yellow Jacket	Morgan 24	J. Christopher Woolsey	DNS	225	11	17

Miami to Nassau Race - I love Peanut Butter

The course was from Miami to Great Isaac Light and leaving Great Stirrup Island to starboard

Prepping for the start

We has a pretty decent start by owning the left side of the line. It was pretty much a fetch with 16 knots of wind with the heavy#1. We carried this until we could fly the jib top well past Great Isaac Light.

On the way to Great Isaac Light

Upwind in the gulf stream is always a challenge, but the 10-15 degree 'push' you get from the current makes it worthwhile.  Carinthia, who just eked around the Great Isaac Lighthouse, but a number of boats had a hard time getting around and had to throw in multiple tacks to make it.  The right turn we had been looking forward to became more of a labor than we expected as the wind piped up at around 2 am to 27 knots with storm bursts we couldn't see coming. All we could see was low hanging clouds sweeping across. "We sailed a bit more conservatively as we had moments where the wind would go from 15 to 25 knots in seconds." Having a jib top in the sail quiver helped them with their tighter wind angles at the northern most points of the course and they "finally got the kite up about an hour before the finish." Carinthia flew along at 12-13 knots. That seems fast until you see the speed the TP52 Decision was clocking...over 20 knots of boat speed at their peak according to their race tracking page. Congratulations to the big winners of this year's Nassau Cup, Stephen Murray Jr, of the TP52 'Decision' in IRC and Frank Atkinson and crew of the Fast 40 'Different Drummer' in PHRF. The course from Miami to Nassau is made up of three legs - the crossing of the Gulf Stream, Great Isaacs Lighthouse to Great Stirrup in the Bahamas, and then the southward turn from Great Stirrup to the finish in Nassau. 14 of the 15 boats who started finished on Friday, with one boat dropping out early due to equipment failure. The Race Committee could not have asked for better or more challenging conditions - clocking, then backing breeze, velocity from 15 - 27 knots, and 70 - 80 degree temperatures. Tom Lihan, crewing on Decision, said, "we never tacked, but we were constantly thinking, wondering if we should follow the rhumb or look at the current, which sails to use (they had 7 changes and flawless crew work), watching the weather....these were classic conditions for this boat." Part of the Decision team was made up of Morning Light crew, Lihan said, and they've sailed together enough to make the work look effortless. The conditions were just not right for our boat. The wind was too high to fly the spinnaker but our competition could get more boat speed. The crew rode the high side all night and Nicole's main diet was peanut butter to settle her stomach. In sleep mode she found a spot next to the stove holding a plastic bag. Still it was only enough to get a 4th.

Crew: Nicole Neeley, Erik Ryan, Karl Kuspa, Nancy Caldwell, Colleen Flanagan, Greg Thomas, Paul Falcone, Jim Best. 

Full results posted here.

Finish in Nassau Harbor

CYC Mac - Just like Lake St. Clair

From left to right: Fred Rozelle, Steve Rozelle, Fred Kreger, Nancy Caldwell, Pete "Camper" Peterson, Mike Henk, Dale Marshal, Harald Kolter

The CYC Mac had 9 J120s sailing. We started with 16 knots of air out of the southwest. We chose to start on the right side of the course. Of course Hot Ticket was just to our left. We almost started early so we kept the sprit in to prevent it. HT immediately put up her .6 spinnaker where it took us a little longer.

Jayhawker behind Flyin Irish...little did we know how much we would be looking at them

Steve Rozelle trimming the spinnaker...again looking at the stern of Hot Ticket

Gorgeous Lake Michigan Sunrise

About 35 miles farther up the course the wind started to peter out. The bulk of the fleet was on rhumb line where we were a couple of miles to the east. Fortunately the wind started to fill in from the right and we were one of the first to receive it. Another 16 miles up the course the wind died and rotated another 180 degrees. Later that night we were see 16 knots to the north by northwest. By daybreak we were crossing tacks with Flyin' Irish and Jayhawker by Ludington.

We sailed to the Michigan shore to get the onshore winds. With the northwest gradient we got a lift and more pressure. Jayhawker and Flyin Irish had the same idea.

We had good luck tacking to weather. We seemed to be able to point higher and a little faster than the other two J120s. By staying in shore we managed to maintain a higher point and with a little more pressure went faster than the boats out in the lake with a onshore breeze after 2pm. After tacking around Sturgeon Point it was a reach up the Michigan coast. The real question to us was how was Hot Ticket doing. She was probably 10 miles west and a tad a little farther south.

Going to weather off of Sturgeon Point at dawn

Sleeping Bear Dunes

Dale Marshal

Fred R. and skipper discussing strategy over dinner

This was Fred Kreger's 100th Mackinac. He rode the rail just like everyone else.

Approaching the Manitou Passage we were ahead of Jayhawker and Flyin Irish by at least a couple of miles. Since we were approaching from the west of the islands a decision to be made was to go inside or outside the islands. I ran an optimum path on the laptop and it suggested going through the passage. Fred and I agreed that if we ran on the outside it could get sticky if the wind changed. We sailed through the passage and the other two J120s followed us. Still we knew Hot Ticket was coming in from the west and would probably go outside the islands. If everything worked they could of got a rung up on us.

Course through the Manitou Islands

Coming out of the Manitou's the wind again went to bed. Our competition came screaming up to us and at different times they passed us. Fred had enough sense to put up the .5 oz drifter spinnaker and we were one of the first boats to come out of the hole.

Just south of South Fox Island the wind went to bed allowing Jayhawker and Flyin Irish to nearly pass us. Fortunately after putting up the drifter we were one of the first to sail out of the wind hole.

Ile Aux Galets Shoal just south of Grave Reef

Flyin Irish got a little ahead of us but sailed more easterly of course with Jayhawker following. We were on a northeast course. The wind started out of the southeast and the wind was forecasted to go more southwest. That enabled us to get leverage on both of them when we got to the Graves Reef Light. Also Hot Ticket was unable to press their separate lane to their advantage.

 Approaching Graves Reef Light

At Graves Reef it was a question of staying ahead of our competition. Past buoy #3 at the west end of the Mackinac Straights it was our goal was to stay between the finish and the others. We did manage it although as the wind moderated Flyin Irish managed to catch up a little.

Camper in charge

Flyin Irish under the Mackinac Bridge

Flyin Irish never was out of sight since Ludington.
The white spinnaker behind her is Jayhawker

Fred Rozelle under the Mackinac Bridge

As we got closer to the finish we saw that out of desperation Flyin Irish and Jayhawker started to jibe farther out from the rhumb line. We did finish first in class with the Detroit boats taking 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th place. It had to be frustrating for the other J120s to watch us take it away. Amazingly it turned out to be a longer version of the same boats beating each other up on Lake St. Clair.

Finishing with "Cone of Silence"

Going east early helped Carinthia stay in the front

Results: 1st out of 9 J120s in class, 13th in a fleet of 152 boats
Link to the results: here
Link to race tracking: here

Chicago Delivery Surprise

I thought this was a neat picture of Carinthia approaching Chicago for the delivery from Mackinac Island. I just woke up from a few hours sleep. Immediately I went to visit the back of the boat when there was Jayhawker with a woman taking photos. This picture was taken after I discovered my lack of privacy.

Bayview Mackinac - Can we get a break?

Crew in Port Huron from left to right: Nicole Neely, Fred Kreger, Kurt Hahn, Mike Henk, Pete "Camper" Peterson, Nathan Caspers, Nancy Caldwell, Colleen Flanagan, Hank Mistele, Harald Kolter

This race we got 4 crew members from Night Moves to come since their boat was not ready after running into a SUV.

We did not use this device enough

Going to weather

Start your engines

The start was with the J35s. We managed to start on the left side of the line. I noticed there were no boats on the weather side of the line and it looked like nobody could reach it. Unfortunately a J35, Night Train, came from the leeward side we had to slow down so we would not get caught barging. Although we were about 5 seconds late we had decent start. The first mistake I made was calling for the .75 spinnaker because of the tentative thunder storms. The other J120s used their .6 spinnakers and the sail area allowed them to get ahead of us in the first mile. We later changed to a .6 but never seemed to be able dig out of the hole.

After the start...Capers eventually got the lead and won the race

All the J/120's had a MB sticker on their sprits in honor of Mike Badendieck

The later classes got some storms with wind in them

Going to weather Monday morning, a little colder and rougher

West of Bruce Peninsula before Cove Island buoy - we were the farthest east

Fred's 99th Mackinac

The weather report was pretty inaccurate after the start. There was low center that was traveling across the lake. They get dicey predicting local weather and most of the forecasters said it was going to cross farther north. This creates a lot of wind holes and unpredictable wind directions. As it turned out, Carinthia and Jayhawker suffered from one more hole and although we got a better bead to the buoy, HT, Capers, and FI rounded just ahead of us.

After rounding the buoy we put up the .75 oz. in 16 knots of air and eventually went to the .6 spinnaker when the wind moderated.

Henry in his element

Mike Henk and Henry Mistele

We almost got leverage on the lead three J120s until they got a lift off the lower peninsula

We tried to pull it out by getting in a passing lane. We stayed north of the rhumb line when possible and almost pulled this one out. In the end we could only get a 4th not far behind Capers, Flyin Irish, and Hot Ticket. This was a well sailed race but we could not just get a break.

Here is the results link: finish results
Here is the link for iboat tracking: here

Sail change

Carinthia crossing finish line a Mackinac Island

We got a good mix of running and going to weather mostly
in moderate wind with the requisite wind holes

Unfortunately a J120 has no chance of winning the BYC Mac race with the Cove Island course. The best a J120 has done under IRC is 18th and this year although they sailed a nearly perfect race Capers got a 20th. We won in 2007 on the Thunder Bay course but the entire fleet sailed into a hole. There are no longer many passing lanes on this course. This change does discourage boats from sailing our race. The great thing is that we got to race one design and even though we got our heads handed to us, I love racing these guys.

Scooter came to greet us at the dock

Mackinac Island at last

This race seemed to get it all...wind, no wind, running, reaching, going to weather. We put up nearly every sail in the inventory. What really made it special was that we returned Mike's ashes to the waters north of Boblo Island near the straights of Mackinac. Mike had been stowed below and this was the first time we had seen his remains. We were surprised to find them contained in a Bacardi bottle wrapped in his crew shirt, a solemn moment indeed. Each crew member had a silent moment with him and we sent him to his eternal resting place.