The 2008 Tybee 500 Race Coverage

Tybee Ekes Out Another Victory

The first three boats hit the beach with only three minutes separating all of them. After all that distance it was still a very close race.

Line honors again went to Team Tybee followed in closely by Velocity and the Marleys Yellow. Trey Brown had the lead on the homestretch, when Alan Stewart went out on the trapeze.., but forgot something. You guessed it! He forgot to hook the trap up.

Brown had to single-handedly drop the chute and go back after his crew. (Seems there is some rule that you have to finish with your crew). It was then that Tybee got the lead and held it to the finish.

Tybee had been gaining on Velocity in the last part of the race, but they flipped the boat. Jamie Livingston said, "We got the boat righted in 1 and 1/2 minutes, and had the spin back up and flying in 5 seconds after that.

That allowed Lohmayer and Sonnenklar to slip by into 2nd spot. But shortly Tybee had regained their second spot. That was when Velocity handed it over to them.

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The fleet was able to fly chutes from the moment got to the tip of Cape Canaveral. Marleys Orange dismasted right around the area. Scary thought that the wind would blow them into the safety zone of the NASA lauch area, which is more than heavily secured. Seatow came to their rescue and we might have video of it -- Brian Karr went out on the Seatow boat as well.

After the first three boats hit the beach, there was still no sails in sight. He next boat in was Accelerated Chaos and there was another big gap, followed by Catfever, Seacats, Cat in a Hat, Marleys White and at this point Moose-Burd is unaccounted for. Rumor has it they shattered a board, but we don't know how extensive the damage was.

The surf was pretty high and we were able to capture these shots:

Pierce and Livingston overstood the finish line enough that it would really be hairy going through the surf really hot. So, just before the surf line, they dropped the chute and "hung ten" into the beach in the following sequence:

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Team Velocity saw Tybee dropo the spinnaker, so they decided to follow suit

Monkey see, monkey do. Marleys probably could have easily carried the spinnaker, but opted to take the conservative route.

Accelerated Chaos was too far behind to see the first boats, so had no problem using the kite to come across the finish line.

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Kenny Pierce, skipper of Tybee Island, said Livington was awesome on the trapeze. "He just lays his chicken line in the cleats on his harness and really locks himself in. He was really getting banged around a lot out there." Livingston showed us the trap harness where he attached aluminum clam cleats to each side. When he goes out he just lays the chicken line in the cleats. Livingston added, " the pressure of the chicken line also holds me tighter to the boat so my feet don't get washed out from under me."

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And They ar OFF to Dayton Beach

It should be pretty darned fast ride. The wind was measured at 14 about a half hour before the start, but there was a definite increase right around the start time. The surf seemed to respond to the rising wind and rose a bit higher as well.

Still the fleet was able to negotiate the surf with no problems, albeit they got a bit wet and had a pretty bumpy ride. See the pictures below.

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Please Patronize our sponsors for the coverage of this event. It is costly to make this jouney and to give you the coverage we do.

Good Winds out of the East for the Run to Daytona

The winds an hour before the start are at about 15 mph directly out of the east, but will probably build to 20 or 25 mph before the day is done.

Marine synopsis is a high pressure ridge north of Florida will gradually build eastward into the Atlantic through Thursday. Seas will slowly increase into Thursday due to a northeasterly swell from low pressure east of the mid Atlantic coast. Swells will subside late in the week with winds increasing between high pressure to the east and low pressure to the north. This low pressure system will drag a weak frontal boundary across the area with winds switching to a more northerly direction late Friday into Saturday.

Since it is a sunny day the wind will most certainly build due to sea breezes and will go more toward southeast, which should make a pretty nice spinnaker run for the fleet. The surf is up, but certainly not a big problem. By the time they hit Daytona Beach, however, you can probably expect some pretty big waves to ride in on. Stand by for more

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For Video of the raceg and interviews at the finish, click here!

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