Saturday, January 22, 2011

J/122 GAMBLER/ PowerPlay Enjoy Key West Race Week

(Key West, FL)- A large contingent of J sailors certainly had a wonderful time sailing in this year's Key West Race Week.  With great turnouts in the two strong J one-design classes, the J/80s and the J/105s, everyone was sure to have a wonderful time in nearly perfect Key West conditions.  The six J/24s that showed up in PHRF 3 were wondering where the rest of their buddies were from points north, east and west were hiding! Next time, come on down all!

The sailing was simply wonderful, hard to believe it's possible for the Caribbean trade winds and weather patterns to serve up five straight days of nearly postcard, chamber of commerce conditions when the rest of the world is getting blasted by massive snow storms and extreme cold.  Competitors may have wished for some days of more epic winds, bashing and crashing into ginormous waves, but one can hardly argue with benign 5-18 knot breezes from the ESE to SSW quadrants with plenty of sun!  We even had FOG one morning down in the Keys-- how weird is that?

For Division 1 course, IRC 2 Class saw an enormous fight for who would get the podium honors for third place.  At the end, Peter Cunningham from Cayman Islands Sailing Club seemed to finish on a happy, strong note, getting a 2-4 on the last day to finish 6th sailing the chartered J/122 GAMBLER/ POWERPLAY to a 2-5-7-4-6-5-8-4-2-4 for 47 points, just 5 devilish points from third (other than the overall winner, the J/122 had the best record over the last 3 races amongst their whole fleet).

  

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

J/122 Wins Australian "Ladies Race"

J/122 MARTA JEANE racing off Sydney, Australia in cruising regatta ladies race.(Newcastle, Australia)- The J/122 MARTA JEAN finishes the year with a win in the Ladies skippers race. "It’s supposed to be a fun race", said Maureen Rae, "but we couldn’t believe how serious everyone was taking it. I had never taken the helm before in a yacht race, but with support from husband Steve and an unexpected amount of encouragement from friends & fellow lady sailors, reluctantly agreed to skipper our J/122 for this race."

"At the start of the race the wind was quite variable, anything from less than 10knots up to 20knots and a 2 metre swell, so a lot to take in quickly.  However, the boat was just incredibly light and responsive at the helm and much easier than expected to steer," commented Maureen.  "We came in 2nd across the line, just behind one of the leading point score race boats and 1st on PHS."

Husband Steve was overjoyed saying, "My wife will have more confidence to take the helm when we're cruising and she will definitely have to return to the helm to defend her title next year! These boats are just fantastic.  MARTA JEAN is primarily setup for cruising but we are finding ourselves exceedingly competitive on the race track. What a great way to finish the years sailing."

For more J/122 sailboat information.

  

Wednesday, January 5, 2011

J/122- Milestones & Miles- The 100th Mac Story

Dick and Richie Stearns sailing Bill Zeiler's J/122 SKYE in Chicago-Mac race* Milestones and Miles: The 100th Mac.  Here's a great read for you armchair sailors wondering what it's like to sail one of the world's more popular offshore classics.  Written by renowned SAIL Magazine contributor from San Francisco, Kimball Livingston shares his experiences racing aboard the J/122 SKYE on his blog-  "I love Chicago for the sheer vertical audacity of it.  An astounding (why here, but why not here?) confluence of energies sets this place apart. And when I flew in for the 100th running of Chicago-Mac, the place was alive. Summer was on. In Millennium Park, the whole world was out .

I was on the final leg of my mission to sail milestone editions of America’s three distance classics: Centennial Bermuda, Centennial Transpac, the 100th running of the Race to Mackinac. The opening decade of the 21st century offered that unique opportunity. Now the decade is winding down, and this is my report.

Chicago Millenium Park reflecting poolI sailed Transpac ‘05 on a Cal 40. I sailed Bermuda ‘06 on an Open 50. The final leg would be Mac ‘08 on a J/122 for a grand total of 3,193 rated miles, which is kinda sorta far, except that I have friends who do circumnavigations where that mileage is nothing. And of these distance classics, the Race to Mackinac is the shortest, but it most revels in how hard the race can be—most of the length of Lake Michigan, Chicago to Mackinac Island, 333 miles. This signature event of Chicago Yacht Club has been raced almost-annually since 1898.

If you’re a sailor hereabouts you have to go. Youngsters scouting the docks will ask, “Are you going to Mac?” If the answer is, No, they keep walking.

It’s a cult thing. When you’ve racked up 25 races, you qualify to join the Island Goats Sailing Society, an organization that refers to the experience via these pithy active verbs (their words, not mine): endured, survived, suffered.

I get it. When the wind switches off, the flies arrive. For a while in ‘08 we even had a bat in the rigging. And I’ve never before seen that much lightning from the deck of a boat.

But it’s also so damned beautiful.

It occurs to me that I sailed the 50th Ensenada Race, back in the day, and in the spring of 2008 I was on my way to Mobile Bay for the 50th Dauphin Island Race when I was benched by strep. Milestone event is to journo as flame is to moth. And if you’re a sailor in the bargain, it’s a helluva good excuse. Along the way I got fried, frozen, slammed, sore and high on sailing and life. I made friends, and one friend, well, one friend I lost.

Rich Stearns was our core player aboard Bill Zeiler’s J/122, SKYE (now for sale- see below)—in 2009 and again in 2010 Bill and Rich teamed up to win the doublehanded division—and Stearns explains the Mac as not one race, but four races back to back, through changing geographic zones. This was my second Mac (23 to go) and I’ve built up the conviction that it’s not so hard to win. You just have to be fast enough and smart enough and work hard enough to deserve it; then you need to get lucky several times in a row."  Read the rest of Kimball's story on BLUE PLANET TIMES.

For more J/122 sailboat information and sailing photos