It was another balmy and pleasantly warm July day on San Diego Bay as the SDSPS Sail Fleet gathered for our 1200 start.  Mike Collins on Marilee with crew Gordon Froehlich as tactician, Doran Milne on fore deck, Bob Chapman helmsman & main, Kent Hildreth and Don Smith on Genoa.  Dave Baer arrived on Casamar with crew Mike Fontaine and Mike Sampsel. John Isaksen also appeared on His Knot Hers with crew Dan Norris, Jens Hedegard and a new guy, Chad Corbin.  Don Litzenberg on Jandon with crew Don Litzenberg (son) and Tom McCune rounded out the fleet.  Per the race instructions, all boats were carefully monitoring VHF channel 68.  As Jandon’s crew set out the starting line buoy by G17 we heard the chatter of another race committee.  Someone on their committee boat gave their children access to the VHF to “practice radio protocol” and the airwaves were cluttered with their chatter.  Complaints by other boaters were ignored.  Just after our ten minute horn starting the count down, the other fleet committee boat announced that their race would be delayed for at least 15 minutes.  Marilee’s crew thought the announcement was from the SDSPS fleet so they wandered away from the SDSPS starting line.  Our fleet started promptly at 1200 with Jandon, Casamar and His Knot Hers crossing the line together.  Marilee saw our start and quickly returned for a delayed start behind Casamar.  Jandon rounded the first mark at G15 with the rest of the fleet close behind.  During the long downwind leg along the North Island side of the bay His Knot Hers stayed close to the shore line to take advantage of the diminished effect of the outgoing tide.  This helped His Knot Hers gain distance on Casamar and Marilee and close on Jandon.  At R20 the fleet crossed the bay to FM 19 at the east end of Harbor Island .  Marilee caught His Knot Hers and Casamar but the wind dropped to a whisper and Marilee fell behind again as the fleet enjoyed lunch on the way to G23. As Casamar edged ever closer to Jandon while the fleet closed on G23, Marilee was plagued by a barge from the cruise port area motoring up to G23 and had to cross to the other side of the bay to shake off the barge.  Marilee tacked back to round G23 and crossed over to R24 near Peohe’s and finally picked up some wind to catch the fleet again.  That wasn’t the end of Marilee’s problems.  A winch handle found its way overboard forcing Marilee’s crew to circle and retrieve it before the final upwind legs back to FM 19, G1 and on to the finish line at G17.  Marilee caught and overtook His Knot Hers in a tacking duel on the way to G1 and halved the distance to Casamar but by then the race was over.

So, who won the race?

Congratulations go to His Knot Hers!  Casamar came in second and Jandon took third on handicap.

Thanks to all for a great race.  Hope to see you all on the bay again for the August race.  The race results are attached and may also be viewed below.

Humbly submitted by,
Don Litzenberg,
SDSPS Sail Fleet co-chair