Nacra 5.5, Mark Baker.
Miami Key Largo Race, April 22, 2006

My Shortest Race

After a 5 year hiatus from the pastime of catamaran sailing/racing, I was given permission to participate in the 2006 Miami-Key Largo by the "the boss." As a brief history, I have sailed catamarans since 1986 but have not owned a boat since 2000. One and a half years ago "the boss" allowed me to purchase a used boat….a 1994 Nacra 5.5. It is a beautiful boat that I thought was in great condition.

I arrived at the Rickenbacker Causeway Friday morning and rigged up by myself and then went for an easy sail around 10:30. I had pizza for lunch and then went for a much more energetic single-handed sail from 2:00 until 3:30 in wind of about 10-14 mph.

As other boats arrived in the late afternoon, I felt very good about my preparations and the status of my boat. My crew was to arrive Saturday morning. I was treated to loud music serenading me in my van most of the night as I stayed right on the Rickenbacker.

Daybreak brought leftover pancakes and ham, 6-8 mph breeze and at 7:00, my crew. We made the start line at about 4 min. to start and parked right at the committee boat. We nudged the line for what seemed an hour and after what was really about 2 minutes, had a great start right on the line with I-20s, A-Cats, etc. By the 8 AM start, the wind had filled in to perhaps 14-15 mph and quickly we were double trapezed and close reaching at a speed where we were not giving up much to the larger faster boats.

As an aside, this was the hardest I have pushed this boat since I've owned it. Well, as the race bore on (about 6 minutes) we were really falling into the grove when all of a sudden, BANG! I thought we had snapped a stay, so we immediately turned back towards the Rickenbacker and I knew our race was already over. Funny thing was though, after we turned back, we realized no wires were loose! So what was broken? We looked and pondered and expressed some opinions to each other but could not locate the perpetrator. Well, we certainly were not pushing hard as we reached/ran back to the beach. The boat appeared to be intact but something had to be broken.

As the monohull fleet passed us and we watched the multihulls disappear over our shoulders we had to tighten up a bit to make our launching spot about 1 & ½ miles distant. We had cleared nearly every other sailboat now when we heard another BANG followed by some skipper and crew expletives followed in short order by some swimming. We had managed to break our boat in half now. Luckily it broke the long way and not crossways.

In a nut shell, the first bang was the dolphin striker pulling right out of the bottom of the front crowbar. And then the second bang was the front beam breaking under the mast and the rear beam simultaneously breaking next to the starboard hull. Subsequently, the whole rig came down on the now not-so-supportive hulls. So we were stranded with the boat in pieces but at least floating. It took about an hour of floating and paddling (including going under the Rickenbacker Bridge) but we were eventually able to "beach" and put the remains of my "boat" on the trailer and bring it all home. Later at home, I discovered that the backing plate to the dolphin striker bolts had been corroded by at least half the thickness of the crossbar. And that weakness was the unseen culprit of my race day misfortune.

Of course the fine folks at XYZ Insurance Company won't submit a penny towards my $2500 repair bill due to the fact that "structural failure" is not covered. So a $3.00 roll of tape for the sail, a 4 inch piece of oak to fit into the rear beam, and a new front tube from an aluminum welder and I'll be back in business. But, if anyone has any used Nacra 8 & ½ foot beams and/or an old Mylar 6.0 mainsail that I could modify into a 5.5 square top…please let me know…..

Happy sailing and see you at some future race….

Sincerely, Mark Baker 386 795-2348