Madden’s Stark Raving Mad the runner-up

Perhaps Jim Madden’s first words as his Stark Raving Mad III finished the 60th Newport Beach to Ensenada Race Saturday indicated that he was looking on the bright side.

“We’re alive and we made it,” Madden of Newport Beach said to a press boat after he followed Magnitude 80, the boat sailed by Doug Baker.

Baker’s Mag 80 finished first, 12 and a half minutes ahead of Stark Raving Mad III, in the elapsed time of 21 hours, 4 minutes, 23 seconds.

For a short time, Madden still had some sort of satisfaction, as his handicap time was 75 minutes better than Baker’s. But less than three hours after finishing, Madden saw his top handicap time bettered by Alec Oberschmidt’s Staghound, which was 19:08 quicker than Madden.

Throughout the majority of the race, the sailors had to deal with slow winds. They did their best to take advantage of an increase before sundown Friday. The winds picked up to 10 knots for 125 nautical miles off Point Loma, and for a few minutes rose to 12 to 13 knots, but only for a few minutes.

To put the slow pace in perspective, Baker’s elapsed time of 21 hours, 4 minutes, 23 seconds was nearly twice the record time of 10:44:54 set by Roy E. Disney’s Pyewacket in 2003.

H.L. Enloe of San Diego and his LoeReal had the third fastest elapsed time Saturday, finishing in 27:36.13.

Awards will be presented at the courtyard of the Bahia Hotel today in the afternoon. The top two receive the Newport Ocean Sailing Assn. trophy for fastest elapsed time.

The Tommy Bahama trophy goes to the best corrected handicap time.

— From Staff Reports