SLOWEST CHICAGO-ST.JOSEPH RACE EVER WON BY TURNING POINT

DAS BOOT WINS SLOW ST.JOSEPH-CHICAGO RACE

BOOT WINS OVERALL BISTATE

(Sunday, August 31, 2008) It took over 16 hours for Turning Point to sail the 50 miles from Chicago to St. Joseph on a race that started Friday evening. In the end, when the wind picked up a bit near the Michigan shore, she crossed the finish line over half an hour ahead of 2^nd place Mojo to win the longest Chi-St.Jos race ever in the history of the 40.7 fleet (since 2001). Tsunami finished in 3^rd place over 20 minutes behind Mojo. The wind was only 4-5 knots at the start but after midnight that seemed like a good breeze compared to what the fleet faced the rest of the night. Between midnight and dawn the wind frequently dropped to zero to 2 knots. The light wind was due to a slow-moving high pressure system over the upper Midwest.

On the race back to Chicago, on Sunday, the wind was only slightly better, allowing the winner, Das Boot to finish in just under 12 hours. 2^nd place on this race went to Collaboration and 3^rd place went to La Tempete. Winds on this race were generally 6-8 knots but there were periods of zero wind and zero forward progress. During periods of dead air, crews on a few of the boats took the opportunity to escape the intense sun and took a refreshing dip in the Lake.

On Saturday between the races, the 40.7 Fleet sponsored a beach party, complete with full bar and volleyball. Close to a hundred crew and their friends and relatives, representing most of the ten vessels of the Chicago Beneteau 40.7 Fleet participating in the weekend races, showed up for the fun. The party was organized by Tory Enerson of Tsunami.

Taking the opportunity of having a large number of the fleet’s crew members present, Tory Enerson and Bob Vickery, Collaboration’s skipper, made brief public announcements of appreciation to fleet captain Ron Buzil. Accompanying the ceremony, Ron was presented with a framed photo of his boat, Vayu. The photo was autographed by many fleet members. In addition to the photo, Ron was also presented with a very nice mantel clock/barometer. Ron has been captain of the fleet since 2002.

As the sun began to set over the Lake the beachgoers made there way up the dunes to dinner at the St. Joseph Yacht Club and elsewhere. Later an awards ceremony and party with live band was held at the club.

On the Chicago to St. Joseph race, the skippers of 1^st place Turning Point were Dave Hardy and Bill Bartz. On 2^nd place Mojo, the co-skippers were Jeff Comeaux, Gary Powell, and Scott Ruhlander. This was Mojo’s first award flag in the 40.7 fleet. The skipper of 3^rd place Tsunami was Don Hayes with tactician Tory Enerson.

Collaboration 2 under skipper Bob Vickery did not finish Friday’s race. The last boat to finish on Saturday afternoon was Clem Boltz’ Cancan deux, who took almost 18 hours to finish, at an average speed of 2.83 knots.

Winning skipper Dave Hardy had this to say about the race:

“We were very pleased to do as well as we did, especially because we originally expected the wind to go left after the start and therefore wanted to be on the left side of the fleet. After our pin end, port tack start that seemed to work out pretty well, we were feeling pretty confident in our strategy...but then the wind went right. All of a sudden we're on the wrong side of everyone. And then the sun goes down and we loose sight of everyone.

“We were pretty discouraged at that point, but knew all we could do was sail what we had so we tacked on the header which eventually brought us down to course.

“Yeah, we saw 0.00 on the speedo for awhile, but we never did loose steerage. Early on in the doldrums, we seemed to be one of the first (of those around us) to hoist our "A". That seemed to do well for us. We passed several boats with only jibs up, several of which seemed to be larger. Almost without fail, on each boat we passed, we'd hear a lot of commotion, see a few flashlights bounce around the deck, and then we'd see their chute go up behind us -- It's always fun to pass bigger boats.

“Anyway, we had no idea how we were doing when the sun came up. Last we saw, LaTempete and Collaboration were north of us, and Tsunami and Cancan south of us. I think this must be the case with everyone, but we figured we must have been the only boat on the lake with no wind. When the sun came up we saw relatively few boats around us and no 40.7's. We figured that everyone but us must already be by the pool. It was a pleasant surprise to find out otherwise. I guess we must have caught a few more puffs throughout the night.”

Turning Points crew for the Chicago to St. Joseph race was: Dave Hardy, Bill Bartz, Mark Schneider, Mike Gebhardt, John Mykleby, Nicole Donohue, Pat McHugh, Darcy Cook, and Jessica Hardy.

After the race we were able to ask Jeff Comeaux, 2^nd place Mojo’s co-skipper, a few questions:

40.7: Jeff, what was your initial strategy and how and why did you come up with it?

Jeff Comeaux: “We studied 2-3 weather/wind reports and initially thought we would drive the typical leg one into the anticipated knock near the Michigan shoreline and tack over and lift to St. Joe. After 45 minutes, we realized that plan was not going to work. The wind got a little lighter and required more footing. We were within a few boats of Turning Point, CanCan and Excalibur. The remainder of our section were all footing considerably lower than we wanted to go. We also kept watching Collaboration 2 and kept asking "where is Bob going?" When Turning Point stopped our ability to sail our course (they started pointing in light air), we considered a short tack to starboard. Before we could prepare to tack, they tacked and we covered.

“The tack to starboard started to lift and kept lifting. At some point, the lift eased and we tacked back to port. The next few hours became a blur with many Heinekens, goofies, wine, etc. During the blur, Turning Point drove under Mojo and was able to drive up to our line. We were short-handed and had a bad jibe during this course change. Turning Point continued driving higher than our course (it must have worked because they beat us). We did hit goose eggs for about 90 minutes. Finally the wind filled and we were able to carry a kite to the St. Joe beach where we took one jibe to finish. This was my longest leg 1 in the 21 Friday nights I have done. It was also one of my most rewarding because we felt the boat was in gear!”

40.7: Were there any exciting moments?

Jeff Comeaux: “We saw the largest satellite I've ever seen. It looked like a glowing beer cap flying West to East.

“Stereo snoring

“Recognition that we finally, finally placed!”

40.7: Who were your crew?

Jeff Comeaux: We did not have our regular bow person or hot box. Hence, the Turning Point roll during the race.”

We also talked to Bob Vickery of Collaboration.

40.7: On Friday night, early, you went north on starboard tack for quite awhile. What happened to Collaboration that night that caused you to withdraw from the race?

Bob Vickery: “At 12:45 AM, after 6 hours of racing we found ourselves moving at an average of 2 knots, with 34 miles to go. The forecast called for calm wind thru 6 AM, implying that our projected finish would be mid to late morning Saturday. With that to look forward to, we elected to retire. Our congratulations to all that persevered and completed the race in very difficult conditions, particularly Mojo, which sailed a great race.”

On Sunday’s race back to Chicago the finish times of the leading boats were much tighter than on the way over to Michigan. Das Boot beat 2^nd place Collaboration by only 2 minutes 19 seconds. Collaboration in turn was only about 5 minutes ahead of 3^rd place La Tempete. Tom Weber was not aboard La Tempete for the weekend. Das Boot’s winning time was just short of 11½ hours. Cancan deux did not finish.

Jay Muller, normally the skipper of Das Boot, and his family Cindy and Cate were not aboard for Sunday’s race. Instead, long-time Das Boot crew member, Bernd Ruschmeyer, was the skipper for the day. We asked Bernd a few questions afterward.

40.7: You guys really took off there after you put up that a-sail. I could just imagine Vickery tearing his hair out trying to catch you. Can I ask you what weight it is?

Bernd Ruschmeyer: “Our A-sail is an A3 from North Sails and is 7 years old now. It is for medium to heavy air and we typically don't use it unless we have at least 7 or 8 knots of wind. But we felt the angle was right for it and thought we should give it a try knowing that it could have cost us dearly if it wouldn't have worked in the lighter air. Fortunately it did and we were able to move away from the fleet but we went back to the VMG later in the race when the wind got even lighter and the angle wasn't as favorable anymore.”

40.7: What was your original plan for the race and how and why did you formulate it?

Bernd Ruschmeyer: “Our plan was to stay out of the fight for the pin probably for multiple reasons. One was to be conservative since we raced Das Boot without Jay and another because we didn't think we had to win it. Instead we wanted to find a spot on the line with room to leeward and windward so that we could focus on boat speed and setting the kite right away. We had good speed off the line and enough separation to able to move ahead of the fleet at the start. The weather forecast we had, suggested that the wind would eventually come out of the north or northeast. So we didn't mind going south of the rhumb at the beginning of the race but wanted to stay somewhat close to it.”

40.7: Did you stick to the plan, or how did it evolve through the race?

Bernd Ruschmeyer: “We basically stuck to our plan but primarily focused on keeping the boat moving fast in the wind we had and kept watching the boats behind us.”

40.7: Can you describe what looked to be a battle with Collaboration in the mid part of the race?

Bernd Ruschmeyer: “That's right. At one point, towards the middle of the race it seemed that the fleet and in particular Collaboration was catching up but also La Tempete and Turning Point seemed to get closer. We weren't sure whether that was due to us doing something wrong or them having more wind than us. We obviously hoped it was the latter and that we would get that wind soon too. At first we started matching Collaboration to keep her at bay but then decided to go back to racing our own race since we probably wouldn't be able to do this for 20 or so miles. On every crossing after that we checked with some anxiety, knowing that we could not discount them at any point, whether we made up or lost ground. At first we made up ground but then Collaboration moved up even closer towards the finish. However, we managed to keep us between them and the finish line until the end.”

40.7: Who was on Das Boot’s crew?

Bernd Ruschmeyer: “Our crew on Sunday was reduced to Mike Kurze, JC Strait, Graziella Loupile, Linas Rastonis, Alex Nikolich, Anthony Martens and Bernd Ruschmeyer. I'd like to add that this was truly a great team effort and everyone stayed focused throughout the entire race and did a superb job in more than one position to compensate for not having Jay, Cindy or Cate on board that day.”

We also talked to Bob Vickery about Sunday’s race.

40.7: Bob, the race back to Chicago was a different story for you than on Friday night. Congratulations on your 2nd place finish. Can you describe your strategy for that race and how and why it was arrived at?

Bob Vickery: “Our pre-race plan was to start at the windward side of the line and sail the shortest distance to the finish.”

40.7: The start was rather sporty, what with the wind from the southeast and most of the boats on port tack. You worked your way through the fleet and several hours out it looked like you were having a battle with Das Boot for the lead. Can you describe the race from your perspective?

Bob Vickery: At the starting gun, Vayu had the best start of our section, full speed at the pin. We found ourselves just behind Vayu, fought to maintain clean air and tried to resist the temptation of heading up. Das Boot started at the committee boat side of the starting line and worked through the previous starters very well. When the wind went light, they sailed hotter angles and kept their boat moving. Das Boot really sailed a fabulous race, start to finish. About two-thirds of the way across, we had Das Boot off our Starboard beam with a mile of separation, when the wind shifted 40 degrees to the right over a period of 10 minutes. Das Boot was quicker to assess the situation, gybe, and sail a faster angle, crossing our bow by 100 yards. After that we traded several more gybes to the finish, but Das Boot continued sailing well with good speed and held us off.”

40.7: Who was your crew?

Bob Vickery: “Mike Barry, bow; Mark Pawlikowski and Dave Kidder, mast; Laura Olsen, pit; Don McGuire & Sue Stewart, trimmers; Doug Schafer, main; Wolf Kaal & Nate Kidder, grinders; Karly Schafer, hoover and Bob Vickery, Skipper.”

40.7: Again, congratulations.

Several members of the fleet weighed in with their thoughts on the Bistate format versus the old Tristate: Jeff Comeaux (Mojo) said, “I love the Bi-State. The usual pattern for leg 1 (NE), leg 2(nothing), leg 3 (SE,N then SW) held true. Monday's race had to be fun with better wind.

“We didn't miss the hideous leg 2 ... however we saw them parked for about 4 hours. The best news is that we all get a real holiday on Monday. No more "one hot breakfast", girls with two teeth, grim food, limited showers and enormously bright lights.”

Dave Hardy (Turning Point) said, “Bi-State vs. Tri-State: I liked the bi-state format. Finishing like that on Sunday was great. I don't know if I would feel the same if the race was as long coming back as it was going over -- finishing at two or three in the AM would be tough. I will be interested to hear from the boats that did Michigan City. They obviously gave a lot of thought to that race this year. I think early reports were positive. It should make for an interesting discussion at our October meeting.”

Cate Muller (Das Boot) said this about the Bistate: “I too enjoy the two-day format! I got to take the boat out cruising Monday!!! My best friend from High school got married on Sunday night (crazy world!) and it was very relaxing to go sailing the next day, not to mention watch others finish. I saw La Tempete out on Monday as well, so I think people enjoyed their day off.”

Jay Muller (Das Boot) added, “Personally, I loved the two day format. SJRYC runs a hell of a party (I like the set up there better than CYC) and having Monday off is great, I hope this is a permanent thing.”

Bob Vickery had this to say about the Bistate format: “I really like having Monday available to be at home. I don't have anything against Michigan City, but I don't like getting home late on Monday. The current format of racing over on Friday evening and returning Sunday is very enjoyable to me. I hope they keep offering this format.”

There was a tie for the overall winner of the Bistate Regatta for the 40.7 section between Turning Point and Das Boot with 5 points each. The tie-breaker and 1^st place goes to Das Boot for their 1^st place finish in the 2^nd race (on Sunday), so Turning Point comes in 2^nd place overall for the Bistate. Mojo, with 8 points comes in 3^rd place. Congratulations to all the winners and especially to Mojo for winning their first regatta flag.

Dave Hardy summed up his feelings about the weekend: “The best part of the race was undoubtedly socializing with the rest of the 40.7's. The yacht club wasn't the only place rockin'. Our raft with the crews of TP, Mojo and Tsunami was pretty festive as well. This is a great group of friends and competitors we have. “

For photos of the Bistate Regatta 2008 and beach party go to: Photos.

For current fleet standings go to: Standings