Team Seacats

Now that the Alter Cup is completed and a new champion crowned (congratulations John Casey / John Williams! – shown here with Gordie Isco – builder of this trophy) and with the Tybee 500 is quickly approaching and we’re getting ready to start a flurry of activity in getting the gear and boat ready to go. We’ve got some trailer storage solutions being implemented, some minor rigging modifications, and some new gear to get ready….stay tuned.

Photo Credit: Roy Laughlin
www.floridamultihullsailor.com

The practice day of the US Sailing Multihull Championship for the Alter Cup launched today on the Blade F16 without incident. Kevin Rejda (Beach Captain) and I moved all 10 boats to the launching area first thing in the morning to get them ready for final rigging before launching for the practice racing. Today’s practice was to give both the competitors and the race management an opportunity to work out the bugs and get things ironed out for the real competition to start tomorrow. After a short concern this morning about not having enough breeze, the sea breeze kicked in quickly and by 11:30am we had 10 to 14 knots waiting for the competitors to get to the course. Several races were had and we swapped out fleets once. Nobody actually finished the practice races (winning a practice race is considered bad luck). Kevin and I retuned the boats this evening in preparation for tomorrow…lots going on in a loooong day.

The news will keep coming but I’m going to switch over to the US Sailing site HERE for most of the detailed information including results.

Originally uploaded by Team Seacats.

Day 2 of the setup and everything is going extremely well! We’ve still not had to drill a hole or set a rivet. Another team of dedicated volunteers and a few competitors came out to help setup the boats. Show here is “TBack” (Terry Back) showing us how the spinnaker halyard block is tied at the top of the mast.

The boats are setup now, all the masts standing and all the rigging done. With luck tomorrow, we should be ready to wheel the boats to the launching area, apply the US Sailing / Rolex graphics, and go out for the practice race. Stay tuned!

Originally uploaded by Team Seacats.

I’m now in Melbourne, FL helping to get setup for the US Sailing Multihull Championship. We spent the entire day setting up the 10 Vectorworks Marine Blade F16s – and things went very well. We’ve not had to drill one hole, set one rivet, or go to a marine supply store yet once! Matt and his gang put in a terrific effort in not only preparing the boats, but the sextuple stack and it’s trailer and supporting structure was an engineering feat to behold! (click the image to go to more photos). Shown here is Matt as he disassembled some of the mast supports. Tomorrow is more of the same. We expect to get the masts stepped by noon and start checking out sails. Tuesday is a practice day and the racing starts on Wednesday…stay tuned!

Originally uploaded by Team Seacats.

Wow…the pva…25 coats!?  This guys is crazy with the PVA (I use 1 light fog coat and 2 thicker coats…it’s plenty), but here’s a good, somewhat high speed, show of making a fiberglass hood scoop.