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.

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