By all accounts we had a fabulous race on Saturday , Sept 17. Considering the recent slate of hurricane activity on the Gulf coast we had a strong turnout of 33 teams register for the one day, 100 mile event.Friday evening registration was followed by free beer and a pulled pork BBQ dinner before Randy Smyths annual Race Secrets seminar, which proved very telling for the day ahead. The Fort Walton Yacht Club did a great job of opening up their nice facilities including guest membership passes for all who registered....which may have been some sailors weakness as the bar proved quite popular both evenings.
The race day turned out with beautiful conditions, clear skys and a great breeeze. The start was on time and it appeared that the entire fleet would be on time for the start. With a northwest breeze of 5 knots the Destin bouys were a nice chute run with an ARC 22 first to the turning mark followed by the RC 27 and Brian Lambert on his CFR 20. This order stayed the same under the bridge until the RC 27 passed the ARC 22 using his masthead chute downwind to the SeaBouy. The order changed at the sea bouy with the RC 27 in first, the 22 followed close behind and then a small gap where the second pack followed. This consisted of the CFR 20, Randy Smyth on a full up race version F 31, another ARC 22 and Mark Murray on a Nacra 20.
The winds held out of the north for all of the morning and into the noon time frame providing for an incredible reach down the beach line. Most of the fleet stayed on the shore sailing within the outer sand bars on the surf line. As this was now a lee shore there were no waves and only flat calm emerald greeen water. The breeze accelerated over the warm sands of the Island and it turned into a double trap reach racing the porpoises down the beach line. It looked like a record time would be set by all teams! On the ARC 22 we made it to the Narvarre pier by 10:30 am and we were at the pensacola pier at11:30. It was around this time that the wind went flat as it changed directions and came back directly out of the south light at first and then built into a single trap reach to the Pensacola pass. We sat in the no wind zone for only around 20 minutes as the RC 27 and F 31 caught us from behind. Then it turned into a drag race headed for the pass. The 22 was able to hold off the 27 to the neck of the pass and ended up being first in the Pass at 1:00 pm. Rounding the Pass it was a double trapped reach all the way back to Fort Walton. We used the chute on the ARC 22 for only 3-4 miles on the return trip as the wind was full on and it seemed to be much faster tight reaching doing the wild thing to stay lower on the course and close to the channel. The high performance teams sailing with smaller high aspect chutes carried them most of the way back double trappped and having a blast.The great breeze freshened as the sun lowered on the horizon and it was nice sailing thru the Narrows with a full on beam reach.
The order of finishers was as follows:
Mike Kelley on an ARC 22 at 4:32 pm followed by Mike Tierney on his RC 27 at 4:59, Brian Lambert on the CFR 20 at 5:07,Mark Murray on the N 20 at 5:09, and Jim Moody on his ARC 22 at 5:18. Billy Whitehurst sailing a turbo charged H17 with screacher and chute finished at 5:40 and corrected out first overall for the 2005 Round the Island race.
I will post the full results including class breakdowns as soon as they become available. This classic race has recieved a breath of fresh air due to the tremendous resources of the Fort Walton Yacht Club and the professionalism of the race organizers . They put together a great weekend with sponsors and tremendous food with free beer all weekend. We look forward to their continued involvement as the event regains the prestige from years past.
