VAYU WINS CYC COMMODORE'S CUP REGATTA

TURNING POINT WINS BOLM

(Sunday, September 7, 2008) In a light and oscillating west wind today, Ron Buzil's Vayu won the first race of the two-race regatta, then held on to 4^th place in the second race to win overall for the Beneteau 40.7 section of Chicago Yacht Club's Commodore's Cup Regatta. Highlighting the close and competitive nature of the 40.7 fleet, in the first race, Vayu beat 2^nd place Turning Point by only 2 seconds and 3^rd place Collaboration 2 by only 7 seconds. Turning Point's co-skippers aboard were Dave Hardy and Bill Bartz. Collaboration's skipper is Bob Vickery. Vayu's tactician was Rob Rafson.

It so happens that the overall standings for this regatta were the same order in which the boats finished in the first race: Vayu 1^st, Turning Point 2^nd, and Collaboration 3^rd. Jay Muller's Das Boot won the second race but due to their 8^th place in the first race, finished 4^th overall. Eight 40.7's participated in this event. Mojo registered but did not compete due to lack of crew. Rhumb Runner was also registered but did not compete.

This regatta was the last of the nine events of which all races comprise the season-long competition for the Best Beneteau 40.7 on Lake Michigan (BOLM). The series is organized by the Lake Michigan Sail Racing Federation (LMSRF). Twenty-six buoy and two long-distance races are included in this series. Four throw-outs were allowed this year. At the end of the year, Turning Point emerged victorious in the thirteen boat competition. 2^nd place is awarded to Collaboration. 3^rd place goes to Tom Weber's La Tempete. It's yet another testimony to the competitiveness of the fleet that Turning Point only beat Collaboration by one single point, 46 to 47 points. La Tempete was only six points behind 2^nd place with 53 points.

Last year, due to the vagaries of the wind and weather, only 15 races counted toward the 40.7 BOLM. That was the least amount of events counting in this competition in the eight seasons since 2001 when the 40.'s began BOLM. Since then, La Tempete has placed in the top three every one of those years and has won the competition four times. Bill Bartz and Dave Hardy, now on Turning Point and from 2002 to 2006 on Finesse, have placed in the competition five times, winning it three times. This is the third time that Collaboration has placed in the BOLM series in the five years since she joined the fleet in 2004.

The course for the first race of the day was set at four legs bearing 275° at a distance of 1.75 miles. Wind speed at the start was about 8 knots.

Winning skipper Ron Buzil described the first race from Vayu's perspective:

"We got out early and warmed up, getting our settings on for the existing conditions and testing the wind up the course. I always like at least half an hour before the starting sequence to get us dialed in.

"After the start we tacked early to port and went to the right expecting a right shift. But the shift kept going left, from about 270° to 255°. I think I even saw 225°. That left us hanging out there in a bad position. We rounded the weather mark in 7^th place. But we had good speed going downwind, and we gybed early right behind La Tempete. Getting on the correct board early was key and using our speed we passed a couple of boats on that leg and rounded the leeward mark in 4^th place. We bailed out on going right on the final beat, as it didn't pay off on the first beat. Instead we tacked to clear our air and then went to the left on starboard tack, following Tsunami. Just as Tsunami tacked back to port we started getting a big knock so we held on. We got knocked about 20° then tacked and the wind went another 10° to the left. We were now in a good position and rounded the last windward mark in 1^st place. Again, using our downwind speed, we held on but towards the end Turning Point and Collaboration came at us fast from the right and it was very close at the finish -- three horns in a row!

"Our boat-handling today, for the most part, was very good. Except for the first gybe on the first race when the spinnaker halyard accidentally got dumped and the chute fell on the deck. We recovered very quickly from that mistake. Every boat, at our level or racing, makes mistakes, and it's how you recover, and minimize their frequency, that keeps you at the top.

"Rob (Rafson) did a great job on tactics. Over the years, we frequently have not had a tactican and that puts a load on me and Steve (Zorn) our primary jib trimmer. I prefer driving and then participating in the strategy but not constantly looking around. Rob and I have raced off and on together for many years. I have a lot of trust in him."

Vayu's crew was: Ron Buzil, helm; Scott Reich, mainsail trimmer; Steve Zorn, jib trimmer; Rob Rafson, tactician; Ed Radzikowski at pit; Lior Cohen, bowman; Paul Molenda, mastman; Jason Navota, spinnaker trimmer; and Teri Amirati, guy trimmer.

Dave Hardy, co-skipper aboard 2^nd place Turning Point elaborated on the regatta:

"The wind was definitely tough to figure out. What we saw for the first race was pin end favored, more pressure right. The next question, naturally, is how do you pull that off gracefully? There was some conversation about a pin end, port tack start - it was a short conversation. Fortunately we hit the line (on starboard) with some speed and, with the help of a small header, we were able to get right. It seemed to work out pretty well for us.

"As it turns out we saw the same for the second race. We knew the wind would get confused as we got closer to shore, but figured the quicker we got there, the better, and we'd just deal with whatever we got once we got there. We were pretty comfortable with the strategy until we saw Das Boot coming in from the left...holy cow, what did Kate and Jay find over there anyway?!

"As far as the last down wind leg of the second race, that was a nail biter. Going into the day, as I'm sure you know, we were knotted up pretty tight with La Tempete and Collaboration in the Best of Lake Michigan series. We figured that the only way to win was to beat both those guys and even then, we needed some help. We were relieved to get two races over the day, even though what that meant was we needed to beat both those guys in both races...riigghht, like that's gonna happen.

"Anyway, we were able to pull it off in the first race, and here we were on the last downwind leg of the last race of the series, ahead of La Tempete, but several boat lengths behind Collab. If they beat us, they win the series, if we beat them, we may win the series. All day Bob and crew were faster than us down wind so we knew we had to do something different. I was seeing more wind left, but figured that boats ahead, Vayu, Tsunami, or Collab, would see the same thing (Boot was so far ahead at that point, they may have already finished, I don't even know). When the lead boats seemed to be going right, we took the opportunity to split. We figured we'd just sneak on over to the left side -- hoping also that you three would get tangled up with each other.

"It did feel like there was more pressure over there and it looked like we were making up ground. Hard to tell though, so we jibed back, short of the layline, so we would converge in time to mix it up with you guys if we needed to before the finish -- last ditch effort, the only thing left we could do. Fortunately, before we converged, we got headed...and then we got headed some more. We got headed down to the line, and you three on the right had to jibe to finish. I'd like to say we planned it that way, but in this case, mother nature was just kind to us.

"As far as boat handling was concerned, I think we had one of our best days on the water. All around the boat, things were crisp, not much talking, and the mistakes we made, we recovered from quickly. We got out early to "warm up". That helped, and I think we were all really focused on the task at hand. We all knew where we stood with LaTempete and Collaboration and knew that the "order of the day" was a tall order indeed. Now, if we can figure out how to do that every day, we'll be in good shape.

"All in all, a great day of racing, and once again, I think as a group, we showed how competitive this fleet is. Very very tight finishes, in spite of the conditions -- how fun is that?"

Turning Points crew consisted of: Dave Hardy, Bill Bartz, Mikey Gebhardt, Mark Schneider, John Mykleby, Nicole Donohue, Rohit (Toke) Sankaran, Pat McHugh, George Christman, Darcy Cook, and Jessica Hardy.

As usual, the tactician aboard Das Boot, the winner of the second race, was Cate Muller. Cate explains their plan and execution when we interviewed her after the regatta:

40.7: Cate, what was your plan on that second race and did it exceed expectations?

Cate Muller: "Our plan was to get out right off the line. Watching the starts before ours you could see that boats were barely making the line on starboard, and although the breeze was taking some big swings throughout the day, at that point it had stayed left for about 10-15 minutes. The plan was to go for the boat end and get off the line with speed. We won the boat, but then started falling down to the fleet, so we immediately tacked out. At that point three or four other boats tacked not long after us, but I think what put us ahead was building speed early. It seemed everyone was slow off the line, so being the first to tack out and build boat speed made a huge difference.

"The plan did exceed my expectations, I knew we were in a good spot, and then it kept getting better! It was very shifty and the breeze was up and down, but Jay did a great job of driving in some challenging conditions, and the crew did a fantastic job of switching gears in the varying wind conditions. I think this helped us to climb up on the fleet and create such a strong lead."

40.7: Can you tell us how you got so far ahead by the first mark?

Cate Muller: "As I mentioned, the clear air and speed was king, this allowed us to really focus on driving the boat well and shifting gears up the beat. I also think we were getting a lot of the breeze up the course first. And being established in the breeze before tacking was huge.

40.7: How did boathandling support your early lead?

Cate Muller: "Boat handling is always huge. Our ability to control the boat on the line has progressed so much this season, we are consistently on the line with good position, and we all know how critical boat handling is at the start. Then throughout the course of the beat we were able to capitalize on our lead by shifting gears quickly and efficiently. I couldn't have asked for better boat handling in the second race. . . it helped us forget about the cluster *@#$ we had during that first race.

40.7: What were your general observations of the wind on the race course?

Cate Muller: "The breeze was certainly interesting. Up the course, there was always more breeze. What we noticed in both races was that tacking out and going right paid (more so in the second race). You were able to sail the majority of the leg on the lifted tack, then about two-thirds up the beat (right around the short mark I think) there was more breeze and a knock. We ate into that knock a little, to make sure we would stay in the breeze when we tacked. Then once we tacked we would be lifted for a bit, but there was also a consistent knock on starboard (with breeze) just leeward of the mark, the perfect opportunity to tack and go for the lay line. Both legs were like this, and I noticed the same trend on the first leg of the first race.

40.7: By the time you rounded the first mark were you doing any covering at all or just sailing your own race?

Cate Muller: "When we rounded the first mark, we were defiantly sailing our own race, but I kept a close eye on the rest of the fleet. I was noticing a lot of breeze coming down on the left side (left when you are looking upwind) and we were getting nice knocks to the mark with those puffs, so I wasn't inclined to gybe out unless the whole fleet did, which never really happened. After the leeward mark, I was looking to see how things shook out. A few boats went out to the left, but they were pretty far back, so I wasn't concerned. From that point on we really just sailed our own race, which proved to work well as we extended our lead from around 1:30 at the leeward gate to almost 5 minutes at the windward offset. It was interesting to see Turning Point and, I believe, Can Can Deux gybe out during the last leg, that move definitely paid off for them, the fleet was so condensed at the finish, and it was really exciting to watch the lead changes going into the finish line. Fantastic racing by the whole fleet in so funky conditions.

40.7: Who was the crew?

Cate Muller: "We had JC (Strait) doing both bow and Mast (which was awesome! He did a great job). Anke was doing sewer and guys. She has never raced with us before, and did a stellar job. With a little parctice she will be excellent. Linas was doing pit this week, filling in for Graz who was out of town, (and) is always a rock. Cindy and Mike K(urtz) were our trimmers and they both did a great go working the boat through some fluky wind. Bernd (Ruschmeyer) was on main trim and Jay was driving. They did a great job dealing with the velocity changes and shifts. Leaving me to do tactics (and adjust the backstay! Never under estimate the backstay!. So although we were a little short this week, we had a great and focused crew, which makes all the difference in the world."

For photos of the CYC Commodore's Cup Regatta 2008 go to: Photos.

For current fleet standings go to: Standings

Final Results of the CYC Commodore's Cup Regatta 2008: