October 2024

I did two back-to-back one-design keelboat events in September. The first was the Sonar World Championship at Noroton Yacht Club in Darien, CT and the second was the 60th Shields Nationals at Larchmont Yacht Club in Larchmont, NY. There were definitely some pros and cons observed regarding the health of the sport. Team Racing seems to rule. At both clubs, these events were obviously for the select few who still enjoy longer course racing where speed and…

The Birds Aboard article by Dorothy Wadlow caught my eye. My friend with five others delivered his Oyster across the Atlantic from St. Maarten to Spain in order to do some cruising in the Med and Adriatic. After a mixed sail and motoring some of the time, we picked up two pigeons off Madera. They settled on the rear deck and looked fatigued. We gave them water and crushed cereal as we had no bird food. They seemed…

A command performance by Corinthian Yacht Club of Marblehead, MA saw the well-honed team skippered by Wade Waddell take its second consecutive victory in the prestigious Resolute Cup, thus securing the venerable club a berth in the 2025 Rolex New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup.   Sailed out of New York Yacht Club Harbour Court in Newport, RI September 9 – 14, this year’s Resolute Cup showcased teams representing 28 yacht clubs from around the country. Twenty…

The International Sonar Class Association held its 2024 World Championship at Noroton Yacht Club in Darien, CT, September 12-15. Thirty-one boats from across the USA, Canada, and Ireland competed on Long Island Sound. © Rick Bannerot/OntheFlyPhoto.net Long Island Sound is known for its hot summer days, but nobody would have expected those conditions to extend until mid-September. On day one, despite her best efforts, PRO Shannon Bush couldn’t conjure up enough breeze to send out the fleet….

Larchmont Yacht Club in Larchmont, New York hosted the Shields Class National Championship regatta on Long Island Sound from September 19-21, 2024. Twenty-two boats were entered in the Championship, hailing from local fleets and Narragansett Bay to Monterey, CA, and Edgartown, MA. Over three days, the maximum eight races were sailed in conditions ranging from light and shifty breezes on the opening day to a clocking easterly with wind speeds in the high teens for the series’…

The 90th Vineyard Race kicked off with a bang on Friday, August 30, as nearly 80 boats charged down Long Island Sound. The conditions were anything but calm—a choppy sea and a stiff easterly wind in the mid-teens made for a thrilling start. But as the race progressed, the wind died down, turning the event into a test. The last boat to cross the finish line was Osprey, a J/35 owned by Gregory Kotzas, completing the 238…

Reported by Party Tree Racing   The Twenty Hundred Club Annual Block Island Race took place August 3-5 2024. This race has a long history with the Twenty Hundred Club and consists of a race to Block Island, a lay day and then a return race, originally on Victory Day. For 2024, The Party Tree and fleet was looking forward to a great race with typical Rhode Island conditions. At 1030 a fleet of nine boats in…

By Marion Bartholomew August 18, 2024 dawned in Atlantic Highlands, New Jersey looking like it would be a fine day for sailing in Sandy Hook Bay, a body of water with a spectacular view of New York City to the north. While Sandy Hook Bay remains somewhat obscure to most, it does have an imprimatur as the site of thirteen America’s Cup matches from 1870 to 1920.   When the 20th Ms. Race, a pursuit race for…

15-Year-Old Completes Challenging Newport Bermuda Race By Cary Wang Editor’s note: Cary Wang of New Canaan, CT was one of the youngest sailors to complete the 2024 Newport Bermuda Race, crewing along with his father John Wang, aboard Monhegan, a J/44 owned by Martin van Breems of Sound Sailing Center. Competing in the St. David’s Lighthouse Division, Monhegan crossed the finish line with a corrected time of two days, 22 hours and 56 minutes. The waning gibbous…

The easiest way to explain the concept of velocity shifts is to start with an example. Imagine you are sailing upwind, close-hauled on starboard tack. It’s a very puffy day, with lots of increases and decreases in wind velocity. However, the wind direction remains exactly the same during all the puffs and lulls. As you sail along, the wind you feel on your face is called your ap- parent wind. It’s a vector sum of the ‘sailing…