Regata del Sol al Sol - St. Petersburg, FL to Isla Mujeres, Mexico - "Race of the sun to the sun"

The race started with very little wind. The race committee has a rule that is really cool so that the race is not delayed.  If there is no wind the committee boat will fly the postponement flag and leads the entire fleet down the course until the wind fills in. We were the second start but passed the entire group of boats by the bay bridge. We were able to see the yacht Second Wind by the first evening but after that we did not see any of the fleet. Difficult to believe, but Carinthia was able to point higher than most of the boats in the fleet. The next 400 miles were 15 to 25 knots of a port fetch. When it came to put a reef in the main we suddenly discovered that we had forgotten to put the reef line in. Although a bit slow, we did get it in by lowering the sail. However when it went back up, there was a tear in the back of the sail. Fortunately it was along the leech cord and we sailed 300 miles with it that way. We also broke one of the genoa halyards but just had to make bareheaded sail changes with the other one.

This was a tedious race and we kept sailing into square waves that caused the boat to drop every 4th wave. In fact I got launched out of bunk and landed on Jim Best's head, a pleasant surprise for him. We rode the southern current as long as we could and crossed the northernly stream as quickly as possible. We had to cross back on a starboard tack just north of Isla Contoy. Bob noticed just west of the island the depth decreasing to 24 feet. We immediately saw the foam of a reef straight ahead and tacked. It was a close call for ending up on the rocks but we did manage to duck that bullet. We did finish on Monday morning at 1: 54 am and the next boat did not arrive for the next 8 hours. That is the first time Carinthia got to be first to finish. We were first in the tiny spinnaker class but the day after our finish the wind finally filled in  from the north so our great performance was nullified.

Beach at finish line

Crew: Bob Declercq, Jim Best, Karl Kuspa, Paul Falcone, Eric Ryan, Greg Thomas

Race Tracking: http://cloud.iboattrack.com/r/start.php?r=2010_regatadelsol

Race Website: http://www.regatadelsolalsol.org/

Final results: pdf document

At dock at Isla Mujeras

Paul Falcone's all terrain golf cart

Paul tried his hand in the suitability of the golf cart's off roading capabilities. In the end he did not care for it, but managed to miss the rocks and landed in the sand. He did not break his neck so I guess it was a relatively successful endeavor.