The Harbor Report: It’s going to be a great weekend on the water
I cannot tell you how excited and nervous I am about this weekend’s Championship Regatta at the Bahia Corinthian Yacht Club. The event will be sailed in Harbor 20s, with the family division taking to the water Saturday and the championships division sailing Sunday.
The family division is all about the photo opportunities, encouraging club members to grab Mom and Dad, go for a sail and spend the day at the yacht club.
BCYC members and nonmembers alike have allowed the club to use their boats for both events. Twelve boats will be in the event, with two round robins of three races to decide who moves on to championships. Eighteen teams have entered the family division and will be competing for the new perpetual trophy donated by Pomeroy family.
All entries will receive a framed photo of their team, and the team that shows the most sportsmanship will win the prestigious Corinthian medal.
The first flight starts at noon Saturday off of M mark and, weather permitting, will finish in front of BCYC with the winner of the race receiving a cannon blast. If all goes as scheduled, the Family Championships should start about 3 p.m.
Looking over the family enter list, it appears the families to watch for having the most fun is too close to call. My guess is that the Foster, Hawkins, Bacon, Mills and Pickell families are going to have the largest smiles.
Starting at 11 a.m. Sunday, the smiles will be replaced with game faces for 22 teams as the first flight of 12 teams heads out to M mark for three races.
The qualifying flights are the hardest part for me. If I can make the cut and make it into the championships, the stress will be lifted and I really won’t care how I finish — yeah right!
My mindset at this point is that I know I am going to have a good time because I am sailing with one of my best friends, Dan Rossen. That’s right — the kids are back in the house!
With Dan being the Problem Child and me as Only Child, the names of our boats, we got the good times already covered. The competition is no pushover and the entry list reads like a world championship regatta.
One privilege of being our town’s harbor columnist is that I am going to throw some bad mojo dust over the fleet by acknowledging the favorites in the paper.
In my opinion, Mark Gaudio will be the favorite to win the Championship Division Perpetual Trophy donated by the Madden family, but he is going to have his hands full with Mike Pinckney, David Levy, Eric Mayol and Erik Shampain all wanting to be the first name on that new trophy.
One of the best parts about sailing in Harbor 20s is that anyone can win on the right day and some of the Harbor 20s Fleet 1 members will be sailing very consistently, like Peter Haynes, Karl Pomeroy, Guy Doran and Jim Kerrigan. Like I said, anyone can win this battle, and it would not surprise me if one of the other 10 teams I did not spread any bad mojo dust on takes home the gold.
After the races Sunday, about 6 p.m., the awards will be handed out, dollar beers will flow and all the “if-only” stories will start. Everyone in the harbor is welcome to come down to the BCYC, observe the festivities and consider joining “the friendliest club in the harbor.”
Special recognition has to be given to Commodore Tom Madden for chairing this event, Paul DeCapua for leading the race committee and Lori Everson for putting together all the awards. This is going to be fun. I hope you can come down and check it out.
Sea ya!
LEN BOSE is an experienced boater, yacht broker and boating columnist.