Fishing Bay Yacht Club:

Home Page redesign � the board approved the concept of removing all but the latest results from the home page and putting them on a More Results and Photos page � which has now been done. Hopefully it will be easier for readers to see the latest news postings and the links to register for the next 10 events.

Crew Finder � Next is a rework of the Crew Finder � to make it more useful to both skippers and crew. We plan to offer skippers to ability to add themselves as �Desirous of receiving calls from people who want to crew� just like crews can list themselves as available. In that regard, we have eliminated the iwanttosail email list � which hasn�t been used and seems to be dated. The first draft of possible Crew Finder text is under Read More.

A fourth Gold for one of my favorite nations

Posted by David Hazlehurst on Thursday August 21, @06:23AM

Like father, like son. Back before WWII, and this started in Europemore than two years before Pearl Harbor, my father turned to BBC to hear the play by play report of the latest Test Match, cricket, between England and Australia. With live coverage unavailable I'm reduced to reading about Olympic sailing on my Macbook. The Star final may not have been a nailbiter like the Laser radial but in the end Ian Piercy and his crew got the requisite place ahead of the Swedes. And in second place none other than Robert Scheidt whose second place finish behind Ben Ainslie in the 1999 World Championships in Melbourne in January of 1999 was one of the few World's where the Brazilian finished other than first. And when Ainslie turned the tables on Scheidt in the Y2K Sydney Olympics his effigy was torched in Sao Paulo. Talk about competition between nations and national pride, maybe the Chinese still have a lot to learn.

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Annual One Design Regatta Success

Posted by Noel Clinard on Tuesday August 19, @01:05PM

On August 9-10, FBYC held its 69th Annual One Design Regatta. Over 80 boats attended including four 420s, six Albacores, twenty-three Flying Scots, nine Front Runners, seven Mobjacks, four Hampton One Designs, twelve Lasers, five Laser Radials (including four Juniors of which three were Girls) and thirteen Optis (of Fleets, two were Red, seven were Blue, four were White and one was Green). Joining the regatta for the first time were four San Juan 21s, led from afar by FBYC�s Mike Chesser. The Mobjacks combined the Event with their 2008 National Regatta, beginning early on Friday for a three day championship regatta for that class.

The regatta was sailed on three courses with separate Race Committees chaired by Rick Klein, David Hazlehurst and Joe Roos. The Albacores, 420s, Lasers, Radials, and the Optis, sailed in the Piankatank River and in Fishing Bay both days, with Sunday having a light thermal breeze. The Flying Scots, Front Runners, Hamptons, Mobjacks, and San Juan 21s were able to race only on Saturday in light and radically shifty winds in Hills Bay, but were becalmed throughout the day Sunday, precluding a single start. Right on its own perverse schedule, a thunderstorm passed to the South and a massive sea breeze kicked in just as the boats were recovered and blew through the porch with a vengeance throughout the awards.

The socializing on Saturday night was enhanced by the �Brain Freeze� Margarita machine operated by John and Maury Hubbard and the splendid Shish-ka-bob chicken dinner purveyed by Arthur and Betsy McCray and their volunteer catering crew. Distinctive regatta apparel was sold by Durwood and Deborah Usry and their crew of volunteers. Later, it was learned that some of the regatta tee shirt and micro fiber designs had not been cured fully by the manufacturing process so the black ink in the designs bled, resulting in a �partial regatta wear recall� by the Event Chair. If you have found that your regatta wear ink bled, you may return it to Noel Clinard at his address in the Year Book and obtain a full replacement. Please be sure to attach your name and address to the returned garment.

Despite the light and shifty winds, awards were made across all the classes, including each and every Opti sailor who participated. The full results are available on the club website, but class winners were: Flying Scot - David Neff, Front Runner - Bobby Phillips, Mobjack - Len Guenther, Hampton One Design - Latane Montague, Albacore - Robert Bear, San Juan 21 - Hans Lassen, 420 - Tony Protogyrou, Laser - Erich Hesse, Laser Radial, Laser Radial Junior, Laser Radial Junior Girl�s - Madeleine Alderman, Opti Blue and Opti Overall - Graeme Alderman, Opti Red - Conrad Roos, Opti White - Stephen McCray, Opti Green - Luke Hayes.

This regatta was made possible by a massive club member volunteer effort other than that mentioned above. Registration was led by Cathy and David Clark and Patricia Montague. Breakfast was provided by Meg Clinard. Bar ticket sales and bar tenders were organized by Mike and Amy Miller. The boats were smoothly launched by four shiny new John Deere and Massey Ferguson Tractors driven by a crew of volunteers under the direction of Doug Anderson and clean-up was handled by a group of Cruisers led by Ed O�Connor, Cruising Division Commander. Thanks to them and the other volunteers filling over 104 volunteer positions with over 80 persons serving multiple roles for making the regatta a success..

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August 19: One For The Record Books

For NBCOlympics.com
Report # 9

The wind was light, the waves choppy, the visibility diminished, and the stakes high. This was the scene for the Laser Radial medal race in Qingdao on Tuesday.   American Anna Tunnicliffe had to finish 4th or better to secure a Gold medal. No USA woman had won a Gold since 1988. Several thousand fans were a few hundred yards away on the sea wall screaming for these 10 women. Among them USA team leader Dean Brenner and the US Sailing Team looked and cheered like Super Bowl fans. The race was one that will be talked about for many years.

All this is easy in big winds, when things are crashing around and adrenaline is racing through the body. But in light wind it is like playing chess on a moving board. Every action must be precise. The Laser Radials are identical in every way. After 10 races, the competitors have learned how to maximize speed, so in this medal race it came down to determination and nerves.

The start looked confusing. I think the competitors were not really sure whether to attack each other or go for a clean start. At the gun, an individual recall flag was flown. On the world feed microphone, I heard the RC say that one boat was over. To my eye it looked like Jo Aleh from New Zealand was the boat that jumped the gun.    But Anna Tunnicliffe immediately turned back to restart, and so did 3 other boats. Remember there are only 10 boats in the race. Lithuania’s Gintare Volungeviciute needed four boats between her and Anna to win the Gold. Complicating the math a little more, China’s popular Lijia Xu was also in the Gold medal sweepstakes.

After the start Gintare took an early lead with Lijia close behind. By time the boat’s reached the first mark of the four leg race LTU was third, CHN fourth and the USA in 8th. The Gold was slipping way for Anna. It got worse. Tunnicliffe tried sailing high on the run and got caught away from the mark and slipped back to 9th. She was now in the bronze position.   There were just two legs and about 20 minutes of sailing to go.

Back on the wind and now AUS and NZL sat on USA’s wind. The leaders tacked to the right hand side of the course because there seemed to have more wind over there on the first leg. At first Anna thought about going that way too. But off in the distance Anna Tunnicliffe saw some new wind developing from the left. She split with the leaders. Time was running out. And then like a miracle a puff of wind that was only about 5 knots filled in from the left. The wind also shifted about 30 degrees in that direction. Suddenly Anna was sailing over the top of CHN and passing six boats. She rounded the last mark in 3rd with LTU leading. LTU needed four boats between them, but she only had one. Anna got another gust and sailed right over the top of Australia’s Sarah Blanck to finish 2nd. With that Anna Tunnicliffe earned her Gold Medal. It all happened so fast that it was hard to believe it was true.

You never know in sports when your moment will come. The NY Giants found a way to win in the 2008 Super Bowl. Who can forget that receiver catching the ball with his head. Or Michael Phelps giving one more power stroke to reach out and touch the wall and win. This race was that dramatic for sailors. And how about this: Anna is only 25, and game to try again. I hope young sailors across America are inspired by this courageous sailor who did not give up.

Excerpts... The sailing association also is building its competitive resum�. A member of the Mid-Atlantic Intercollegiate Sailing Association, the group is an underdog compared with more sailing-focused schools like the U.S. Naval Academy or Georgetown but performs neck and neck with Virginia Tech and William & Mary.

"The regattas are both laid-back and intense," says Overstreet. "They are very sociable off the water, but on the water, rival skippers will rip your head off if you make a mistake and foul them."

Last year, several U.Va. teams went to a regional regatta in South Carolina. Nine U.Va. sailors carpooled to Charleston, slept on couches and floors of students from the host school, then placed 14th out of 16 in the race.

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Laser District Championship

Posted by David Hazlehurst on Tuesday August 19, @08:20AM

No-one is happier than the writer to see Lasers coming back into fashion at FBYC and todays news is icing on the cake.
Golds for former ODU sailor Anna Tunnicliffe and Paul Goodison sailing for GBR, that countries third gold. Closer to home a write up by our own Jon Deutsch, Laser District 11 Secretary about last weekends District Championship at Deep Creek, Maryland with Scot builder Harry Carpenter as PRO. Jon's usual prompt and complete write up follows

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"T'was NOT a dark OR stormy night..." when 11 boats started the Fishing Bay YC SMITH POINT RACE on Saturday afternoon. According to reports, there was plenty of moonlight and gentle breezes (most of the time). RESULTS: PHRF A (2 boats) - 1.Brad Davis, Blade Runner. PHRF B/C combined (5 boats) - 1. Dave Hinckle, Elancer; 2.Eric Powers, Nereid; 3. Brad Miller, Schiehallion. PHRF Non-Spin (4 boats) - 1.Ric Bauer, Desperado; 2.George Burke, Reveille. PRO: Mike Dale.

Remember that advertisement a few years back that featured a beautiful old sailing ship and the baritone voice-over declared, "...the sails aren't made of canvas anymore..."? Well, don't say that to Jerry Latell at Ullman Sails Virginia in Deltaville/Irvington. Jerry's loft has taken on building a suit of sails for the Susan Constant, the largest of the three Jamestown ships. Jerry said. "We will machine stitch the "membranes" and hand work everything else. The edges are all roped and there are lots of grommets and cringles to be sewn and spliced. There are no metal fittings in these sails; it is all done with cloth and rope." Jerry has a blog on this, if you'd like to follow the project more closely. http://latellsailmakers.blogspot.com/ Jerry and Andrea Latell race their B-25, Boomerang, regularly on the southern Bay.

Moving things around on the Home Page

Posted by Strother Scott on Friday August 15, @01:06PM

Last night at the Board Meeting, we discussed Jon Deutsch's suggestion that we adjust a few things on the top of the Home Page. The Board deciding it would be a good idea to remove the "clutter" of results and photos at the top of the Home Page and put most of them elsewhere.

This morning I started that process, and have considerably shortened the number of items displayed at the top. Please Notice the Link to Many More: Results and Photos which will take you to a page with most of the last 6 months Results and Photos.

Please Note - I have now added a list of the most recent volunteers recorded into our system on the left column of Results and Photos . To a large degree they are just as important as the Results. Note that the names are only visible to Members.

The Links to the CREW FINDER has also been minimized, and we hope to add a few good ideas to the CREW FINDER so it will work for all. There is a suggestion that just like Prospective Crew Members can register their interest, Skippers who are always on the lookout for new crew may register their needs.

Thanks to Chip Hall who has agreed to draft some helpful text for the Crew Finder Page - and to Mason Chapman who is going to do the same for a "Welcome" statement.

Please expect to see more changes and let me know if you have any comments for further improvement.

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Meanwhile, up on the Rappahannock / Piankatank Rivers, on Sunday, Lady Nature left racers at Fishing Bay Yacht Club's 69th Annual One Design Regatta breathless - truly. The sound of thunder and lack of wind sent the dinghy fleets in on Sunday with little accomplished, although, as in Hampton Roads, it "weren't for lack of trying!" The Annual One-Design Regatta ran Friday through Sunday, and during the first two days most classes got plenty of racing. The Mobjack Class, for many years a very popular class on the southern Chesapeake and as far north as the southern Delaware Bay, held their National Championship and crowned Len Guenther the 2008 National Champion. Len beat out 6 other racers. Mark Arnold, from Virginia Beach was second overall and Meg Roberts, who grew up sailing the noble Mobjack with her dad, Tom Roberts, finished third. Meg calls West Point, Virginia, her hometown. REGATTA CLASS WINNERS: Albacore (6 boats) - Robert Bear. Flying Scot (21 boats) - David Neff. Laser (12 boats) - Eric Hesse. Front Runner (9 boats) - Bobby Phillips. 420 (4 boats) - Tony Protogyrou. Hampton One Design (4 boats) - Latane Montague. San Juan (4 boats) - Hans Lassen. In addition to the adult classes there were 17 junior sailors racing in Laser Radials and Optimist Classes. PRO - Rick Klein.

Saturday, August 2nd witnessed an all-FBYC team of Sophie Massie, Blake Kimbrough, and Strother Scott Jr. do what had been previously thought next-to-impossible in Nantucket Harbor. On the first day of the August series, the three of them, in the Massie’s Rhodes 19 Toni Too, won a race. The picture to the left is of Toni Too from last year.

This might not seem like that big of a deal, but in doing so, the team snapped a near-unprecedented streak of dominance – about 50 races without a loss. Skip Willauer, a sailor who grew up on Nantucket and has raced the Rhodes 19 Race Horse there for many years, had not failed to record a bullet in any race in which he participated in the last two years. Even though he got the last laugh and finished the day in first overall, the sight of even the smallest chink in his armor was very gratifying to a group of sailors who had been competing for second for a very long time.

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