Team Seacats

That title is a phrase you commonly hear when racing offshore…well….actually, it’s more like “TURTLE!” or “TURN TURN!” or worse since we’re typically making 15 knots or better.  However, I must admit that In the miles we’ve racked up thus far, we’ve never had to be on the watch for a six point buck swimming in the salty water.  Below is a picture sent by Dale Steinkamp to Sailing Anarchy who posted it and a couple more this morning.  This was taken just St. Simon Island, GA – one of the Islands we pass on the way to Tybee, GA.

Another flashback…I’m getting antsy…..You can see Carl Roberts, with whom I had the pleasure of sailing the Tybee 500 in 2005, tripping over the rudder as the announcer says something about “tired bodies”. Although I believe that Carl has a competitive spirit that runs about a billion miles an hour in his blood, he’s cool, calm, and collective on the surface – always (even after I was largely responsible for a 3′ gash in the spinnaker after just launching off the beach for a long leg). I learned a good deal about distance racing and patience from Carl.

It’s a long story but there are people waiting to see these…To hear the full story, you’ll need to ask me in person at a regatta or something….

The intro to this video makes me cringe and sweat cold bullets whenever I see it.  I’m pretty sure one of the guys on the boat is a good friend of mine (edit…it wasn’t who I was thinking of)…but I think I’ve mentally blocked that out.  Watching the rest of this video has me pretty pumped about the Tybee next year.

I awoke this morning, filled my belly with grits, bacon, and french toast, and met David Lennard at the boat where he was already busy making a few tweaks to the rigging to make the boat a little easier to sail. We did some minor things, went to get changed, and hoisted the sails. At 9:30am we were the first off the beach and slowly making our way in the very light breeze to the race committee that had setup about a mile away. An hour later (!), we arrived at the race committee. The other boats slowly meandered their way to the starting area and after an hour, the race committee decided to abandon racing for the day and sent us to the beach.

The standings left where they were yesterday – Nigel Pitt and Trey Brown in 1st with 4 points, Wick and Wick in 2nd with 5 points, David Lennard and I in 3rd with 6 points for the low portsmouth fleet. That is a spectacular place for a regatta and the racing on Saturday was a really good time. Can’t wait until next year!

FULL RESULTS HERE