Crew Notes and District Governor’s Update

Wednesday, July 16^th – Bill Draheim gets a call from Marc Eagan to build sails for Marcus and Andrew Eagan for the North Americans.  Bad news - Bill won’t have time to build us a new set of sails.  Good News – Another good sailor will be using his sails.  Bill says to me - Don’t worry I think it’s more important that we bring our lucky rabbits foot rather than new sails to Lake Norman.  When he’s right, he’s right!  

Monday Winds: 8 to 14 knots (Perfect Breeze).  

Monday morning first qualifying race, we start towards the middle of the line three rows back, take a clearing take to the right ducking 5 to 6 boats, breeze dies out on the left, round with leaders go on to win race.

Monday second race, we start towards the pin, get shot out the back by Marcus Eagan, tack out to the right, cross behind the entire fleet, get right, breeze goes left, play “ketchup” for an eighth.  Bill promises his starts will get better.  So far, no chance of being called over early!

Tuesday Winds: 10 to 15 knots (Perfect Breeze).

Final qualifying race, good start FINALLY, winning race until last beat, Marcus Eagan and Bill Ewing get by us by going to the favored leeward gate and get into better breeze.  Hold on for a 3^rd.  

Wednesday Winds: 10 to 15 knots (Slowly winding left with heavy shore influence).

First race for the championship, round the first mark in 3^rd behind Greg Fisher and Harry Carpenter.  Make up considerable distance on downwind leg.  Greg Fisher hits leeward mark gate and does a 360.  We catch Harry going upwind, lead going downwind.  Greg catches up on last upwind leg.  The race committee sets our finish line 50 feet beyond the windward and offset mark.  As we sail on starboard between the windward mark and the offset mark, the challenger fleet, rounding the windward mark and turning down to the offset mark, blocks us from tacking onto port for the finish.  Greg beats us by a boat length.  Ouch That Hurt!

Second race for the championship, race committee moves course to compensate for the wind going left.  Get good start towards the pin, professional photographer’s boat crosses directly in front of us, had to restrain myself from going crazy.  Initially we stayed left, Marcus crosses in front of us, and we stay left with Harry Carpenter while the fleet is stacking up right taking advantage of right shore effect.  This is where it got tough.  Trying not to get caught too far to the left, we start working our way back to the right, end up crossing behind too many boats.  Harry Carpenter stays left looking bad until the final port tack rounding in the top three.  Marcus ends up winning the right group and gets launched for an easy win.  Greg Fisher and Ira Cohen eventually grind Harry down for second and third place.  What really happened up front is a mystery because we rounded the first mark about 15^th to 18^th place going very slow.  We stayed in slow mode downwind and back upwind.  Wasn’t until the last downwind that we start moving through the fleet.  We decided to go high over the fleet on the port tack, just holding on to an inside overlap on the left gate.  The race committee had moved the weather mark far to the right; we were hopefully going to get some right shore effect.  Everyone in front of us was working out towards the middle of the lake.  Bill and I and everyone behind us were stacking up to the right, near the shore, hopping for a miracle.  After we made it around the right shore, we actually lost a couple of boats.  Everyone around saw us losing ground and bailed out back to the left.  Now there was no option but to head back to the right shore.  We actually had to sail the boat healed up to keep the centerboard from running aground on the sandbars.  Finally on the last tack to starboard, we were over-standing the finish line, we got a shot from the right and were now barreling down to the finish line.  Steve Bellows was one of the boats that had been in front of us the whole race.  He said “I couldn’t see you because of all the other port tack boats, but you guys sounded like a freight train”.  We passed 7 to 8 boats at the finish.  At the time, we felt exhausted and a little defeated.  We were now in fourth place.  

Thursday Winds: 0 to 4 knots (Frontal High Pressure System has landed on top of us).

Sat under shade trees all day drinking favorite beverages, playing touch football, decided to leave boat in water all day and overnight so boat could become one with the lake.  That was our excuse for being too lazy to pull the boat out of the water.  

Friday Winds: 4 to 6 knots (High Pressure – At least one more race is needed to be considered a regatta).

Race committee was looking to get 2 races off.  However, this would be the last race.  I’m glad we didn’t know that at the time.  We start 70% down the line, everyone to windward falls down behind us, and we end up rolling the boats to leeward, finally a great start.  We start out left but end up working middle right.  A few boats way out to the right get a sliver of breeze and boats on the far left come in strong as well.  We end up rounding around 8^th.  Harry Carpenter is close by and Marcus Eagan is directly behind us.  Marcus brings breeze behind on port tack.  Marcus starts to roll us, so we gybe away back towards the middle.  We never see Marcus again as he gets stuck out on the left.  We go back upwind losing a couple of boats rounding the weather mark directly behind Harry Carpenter.  Harry looks back at us, as we both barely squeeze around the weather mark and says “boy that was ugly”.  This is our final downwind leg.  Harry Carpenter is not only ahead, with 10 to 15 minutes left in the race, he is winning the regatta.  We sail downwind on port tack. Harry decides to sail higher hoping to get to the fresh breeze first and to roll the boat directly in front of him.  The breeze is filling from behind and Bill sails straight to the leeward gates.  Harry ends up sailing into the exact hole the Eagan brothers had sailed in the previous downwind leg.  We sail to the left gate with 5 boats ahead.  On this final beat Steve Bellows rounds behind us.  He manages to work right and gets by us with more pressure on starboard tack yelling “Hey boat buddy”. - This was because we had loaned him some parts earlier in the week.  Bill and Steve get in a loose cover tacking dual right up the middle of the course that propels us closer to the leaders just to our right.  As we come in for our final port tack everyone, including Steve, goes in front on starboard tack.  Even though we’re getting lifted on port, the pressure is now moving left to right.  All the boats that had tacked to weather of us were slowing down while we were punching through to the right getting lifted towards the committee boat.  One lone boat had stayed to the right of us.  It was Meredith Dodd with crew John Meredith - on her way to her first first-place finish at Nationals.  We tacked one boat length outside the committee boat to squeak out a second.  

The wind slowly shut down to nothing and 90 minutes later the race committee decided to call it a regatta.  Like last years North Americans at Pensacola this regatta proved to be chess match.  On Thursday, with no air all day, you just have to keep reminding yourself that the long waiting and setting around is just part of the regatta.  Lake Norman, in the summer, will test your patience more than any lake I’ve ever seen.  It’s like White Rock only on a larger scale, so once you commit to one side there’s no going back.  

District Governor’s Notes: The 2003 Flying Scot North American Championship had 90 boat registered.  Each boat was measured using a lottery system.  Depending on what color you drew determined what would be measured.  Our color indicated the boat would be weighed with the centerboard in, the safety equipment checked, and our main sails would be measured.  The whole process from our late Sunday registration to final measurement took all of 45 minutes.  The crew from Lake Norman had certified almost 80 boats by Saturday.  This new system was a huge success and will make it much easier for clubs hosting future Flying Scot Nationals.  From now on all boats will be measured at every North American Championship.  There is no waiver for having a certificate from the previous year.  The FSSA weighed all the rudders to determine a future minimum weight for complete rudder head and blade assembly.  All rudder blades must now be approximately 3/16-inch plate.  One further note: There will be no sail measurement at next years Flying Scot Mid-Winters.  Amen!  Next years Flying Scot North American Championship will be at Lake Carlyle, Illinois - July 17-23^rd.

Scott Mauney
Texas District Governor

Championship Fleet - Final Results
Submitted by: Josh Jones

 

Pl	Sail	Crew	From	1A	2A	3A	Tot
1	5346	Bill Draheim & Scott Mauney	Corinthian Sailing Club	2	8	2	12
2	92	Marcus Eagan & Andrew Eagan	Southern Yacht Club	5	1	10	16
3	5419	Harry Carpenter & Carrie Carpenter	Deep Creek Yacht Club	3	4	9	16
4	5391	Greg Fisher & Joann Jones		1	2	14	17
5	3933	Larry Lewis & Starr Lewis	Lake Norman Yacht Club	9	7	8	24
6	4814	Ralph Coffill & Christine Coffill	Moriches Yacht Club	7	15	3	25
7	2068	Ronald Pletsch & David Pletsch	Sarasota Sailing Squadron	14	6	6	26
8	2929	Dan Neff & Jim McCarrick	Old Greenwich Yacht Club	6	13	7	26
9	5107	Steve Bellows & Cayne Miceli	Pensacola Yacht Club	12	10	5	27
10	5246	Bill Ewing, Eileen Ewing & Kris Smith	Monmouth Boat Club	10	9	13	32
11	3109	Dave Neff & Tom Lawton	Lake Norman Yacht Club	11	12	15	38
12	5510	Larry Taggert & Carrie Berger	Southern Yacht Club	17	11	12	40
13	4801	Meredith Dodd, John Meredith & Ashley Dodd	Deep Creek Yacht Club	20	23	1	44
14	4240	John Luard & Toni Gahn	Monmouth Boat Club	13	5	26	44
15	5040	Mike Roberts & Stacey Roberts	Davis Island Yacht Club	18	16	11	45
16	4427	Hans Noordanus & Richard Dynes	Lake of the Woods Sailing	4	14	29	47
17	5171	Josh Goldman & Ian Gill	Cedar Point Yacht Club	8	20	23	51
18	2162	Susie Stombaugh & Tim Stombaugh	Cave Run Sailing Assoc.	15	18	19	52
19	5252	Ira Cohen & Brian Hayes	Hempshead Bay	16	3	34	53
20	16	Paul Lee & Denise Lee	Detroit Yacht Club	21	17	16	54
21	5347	Charles Buffington & Sarah Buffington	Deep Creek Yacht Club	31	24	4	59
22	3913	Chris Danilek & Linda Danilek	Old Greenwich Yacht Club	23	22	17	62
23	5318	Jeff Penfield & Bob Nichols	Sarasota Sailing Squadron	24	26	18	68
24	5520	Fred Strammer & Fred Strammer Jr	Sarasota Sailing Squadron	29	19	25	73
25	5230	Forest Rogers & Mike Ehnis	Crescent Sail Yacht Club	26\ZFP	21	27	74
26	5005	Don Smith & Chris Kicinski	Lake Norman Yacht Club	28	30	20	78
27	5214	Bane Shaw & Ann Shaw	Lake Norman Yacht Club	22	27	30	79
28	13	Al Hersey & Del Foster	Sarasota Sailing Squadron	30	32	24	86
29	1104	Starling Gunn & Bill Larson	Lake Townsend	27	25	35	87
30	4952	Ken Gorni & Ed Cherry	Lake Norman Yacht Club	33	36	22	91
31	4979	Steve Last & Steve Rajkovich	Crystal Sailing Club	36	35	21	92
32	4938	Anthony DiResta & Regina Lindahl	Moriches Yacht Club	25	31	36	92
33	3076	Tom Pinkel & Peggy Woodworth	Carlyle Sailing Assoc.	26	34	33	93
34	2259	Don Griffin & Barbara Griffin	Deep Creek Yacht Club	35	28	32	95
35	1866	David Mahan & Bruce Orthrop	Deep Creek Yacht Club	32	33	31	96
36	4115	Bernie Knight & Terri Swift	Pensacola Yacht Club	34	29	37	100
37	4991	Dan Goldberg & Joni Reis	Moraine Sailing club	38\DNS	38\DNS	28	104