Holiday Regatta

Interesting day on the water for the Holiday Regatta. A windless grey morning greeted us and we were in postponement at the dock until about 11am. Headed out to course and were postponed for another 2 hours. Finally found a little wind and got one race off. Here is a shot from the start. You can barely see Bill from Rock and Roll at the top spreader (glad that's not my job!). We got second in this race. The second race started with the rain and ended with abandonment (thank god!). It was a race to the bar.
Day 2 today...and it's already raining. Hopefully everyone's foulies are dry and ready to get wet again!

VNH Charity Regatta

Great day for the SBYC Charity Regatta for Visiting Nurse and Hospice. Fire Chief Andrew DiMizio joined as the celebrity crew as we raced PHRF. We finished 2nd to Ken Kieding driving the J92. Fun time was had by all! And, a big happy birthday to David!

Santa Barbara News-Press article 9/6/12

Skian Dhu capitalizes on mistakes to take win
By SEAN LEWIS News-Press Correspondent 
2012-09-06 13:02:28 GMT

Skian Dhu, right, jockeys for position with Taxi Dancer as part of the A Fleet race in this week's Wet Wednesday contest.
MATT WIER / NEWS-PRESS

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One by one, the boats around Skian Dhu made mistakes, and one by one Skian Dhu picked them off.

The Far 40 boat used a direct approach in strange winds Wednesday, and it paid off as Dirk Freeland's vessel took first place in the A Fleet for the weekly running of the Wet Wednesdays sail races out of the Santa Barbara Harbor.

"(Tactician Jeff Grange) made some good reactions to wind shifts," Freeland said. "We reacted to wind conditions a little quicker than the other guys did. That was the main thing."

The fleet's most recognizable boat and the Summer Series winner, Taxi Dancer, finished fastest, but ended in second place because of the handicap system that evens the playing field. It didn't help that the big boat made a bit of a tactical error by heading toward the harbor after rounding the bell buoy on the penultimate leg of the race.

Skian Dhu was able to make up valuable time by keeping a simple course in the shifting winds, while Taxi's gamble backfired. Meanwhile, Spring Series champion Radio Flyer was well behind after dropping its spinnaker when it appeared to hit a patch of dead air on the rainy but calm sea.

"It was fun to sail in it, only because it was so shifty and you had to keep your head outside of the boat and look at what was coming," Grange said. "The strategy that I took tonight was just to keep the boat heading toward the next mark, or toward the pressure. Darker water - we would head toward that as long as it was toward the next mark. Taxi sailed all the way to the beach after the bell buoy. We could tack and head straight toward the boot and see our next mark, and they tacked and all of a sudden we were neck and neck with them when they probably had their (handicap) time on us at that point."

Grange and Freeland were joined by Jeff's wife Caroline, Freeland's eldest son Jesse, Jane Watkins, David Lyon, Pete Mohler and Matt Wilson. The group has been solid throughout the Fall Series, and is in first place after six races.

Last week's second-place finish was the only time Skian Dhu finished out side of the top spot in this series.

"We're just showing up and the breeze has been good," Freeland said. "I've been doing Wet Wednesdays for almost 40 years, so we know how to do them."

Skian Dhu's success this series may come as a bit of a shock, as the boat finished near the bottom in the fall and summer, but that was mostly because the crew took several weeks off from each of those series.

"Part of it is just that we focus so much on the out-of-town events this year," Grange said. "We had a series that is all one-design. Either we would not have the sails or we'd sail with five people. The boat went away for two months to get repainted, so we missed time with that. Then it's hard to keep a crew around that's not sailing for two months, so we lost crew. But this is a good crew to have around."

With just two races left, and a Wet Wednesdays rule that allows a team to drop its worst finish, Skian Dhu looks like a prohibitive favorite to claim the series in the A Fleet.

email: sports@newspress.com

Fiesta Cup Wrap Up

Here is Jeff's article for the Farr 40 West Coast site:

Steve Murphy’s JoAnn posted two bullets in Sunday’s two races to be the only boat to win two races and came from behind to take the victory in a tiebreaker with Jeff Janov’s Dark Star. JoAnn’s weekend didn’t begin so well as they fouled in the first race of the regatta and took a scoring penalty to post a 5^th. From there the JoAnn team of Andrew Campbell, Karen Campbell, David Stotler, Sam Heck, Stacie Straw, Christine Perakis, Ray Winstead and Jeff Shenton just got better and better. The racing was tight all weekend with Bill Durant and Jeff Shew’s Viva La Vida completing the podium in third, two points back.

Saturday’s conditions started with 6-8 knots of breeze steadily increasing to 14-15 knots by the end of the final race. The fleet was excited to compete against two new boats making their debut at a Farr 40 West Coast Fleet event. Wild Thing, owned by Rhonda Tolar, and Flyer, owned by Stanford Shaw, made their presence known with solid racing all weekend. Saturday’s races consisted of two and three lap courses with tight mark roundings and crew work at a premium. Three different boats won the three races and scores were tight at the end of the first day. As the crews retired to the yacht club for free margaritas, beer and Mexican cuisine, the scores showed Dark Star in the lead on a tie-breaker with Viva La Vida. JoAnn was two points back in 3^rd and Skian Dhu another point back in 4^th.  Foil held a one-point lead over White Knight for 5th and Wild Thing was two points ahead of Flyer for bragging rights of the new boats to the fleet.

Sunday’s conditions were similar to Saturday, except the wind took a little longer to build into the teens.  The first beat of the first race saw better pressure on the left and JoAnn pounced on it leading wire to wire with Dark Star second and Viva La Vida recovering to third. Skian Dhu was unable to recover from an over early effectively taking them out of contention for overall. This left Dark Star, Viva La Vida and JoAnn with only one point separating them. Each boat had won one race, so whoever won the final race would win! JoAnn got off the line well near the boat end with Dark Star slightly to leeward and Viva La Vida further down the line. JoAnn made the most of getting to the right side first and led at the top mark. From there JoAnn sailed conservatively and protected the right side to win the final race and the regatta! Gordon Leon’s Foil, showed they had been working hard practicing and was able to have their best race in the finale to beat White Knight for 5^th place. Complete results are below.

The final event of the 2012 Season is Campbell Cup at Long Beach Yacht Club in October.

Rank	Boat	SailNo	HelmName	R1	R2	R3	R4	R5	Total
1st	JoAnn	46957	Steve Murphy	5 SCP	2	2	1	1	11
2nd	Dark Star	80808	Jeff Janov	2	4	1	2	2	11
3rd	Viva La Vida	131	Bill Durant / Jeffrey Shew	1	3	3	3	3	13
4th	Skian Dhu	51044	Dirk Freeland / Jeff Grange	5	1	4	5	6	21
5th	Foil	50060	Gordon Leon	6	5	5	7	4	27
6th	White Knight	888	Zoltan Katinszky/Tom Bodkin/John Forbes	4	7	6	6	5	28
7th	Wild Thing	USA41	Rhonda Tolar	7	6	8	4	8	33
8th	Flyer	104	Stanford shaw	8	8	7	8	7	38

Fiesta Cup update

We are in fourth, but only three points out of first. Yesterday was a beautiful day on the water. The fog cleared leaving aquamarine water, sunny skies, and building breeze. Crew worked well together and we had a lot of fun. Finished 5, 1, 4. Here are some photos from our second race as we head into the finish.

Dirk with all the competition behind him!

Nice when there are no boats between you and the finish line!

And here's Lucas hanging with the Dark Star crew. They said he was a great addition, though I think his parents were conflicted about rooting for their son versus the Santa Barbara boats!

Fiesta Cup practice 7/20/12

Skian Dhu got some new 3Di sails and we took her out yesterday to check them out. It was a beautiful Santa Barbara day; maybe a little too windy for the new light. Hoping the breeze stays for racing today.

Go Skian Dhu!

Fiesta Cup 2012

Looking forward to Fiesta Cup in Santa Barbara. Skian Dhu will be practicing tomorrow to prepare for the weekend's festivities. Eight Farr 40s will competing for the Fiesta Cup this year.

Go Skian Dhu!