Team Seacats

Nigel Pitt and Alex Shafer win the U.S. Sailing Multihull Championship. After years of competing in this Championship and placing the top three, the team of Shafer and Pitt were finally able to break through and take the win by a narrow margin of two points over returning champions John Casey and John Williams and five points over the team of Tomko and Billings.

The final day of the U.S. Multihull Championship concluded today with one last A-fleet heat which concluded Race 11. Off the start line, the points leading teams of Pitt and Casey were unintentionally fouled off the start line by another competitor leaving them both late to the start line while the third place team of Tomko and Billings was well underway heading up the course. Both teams managed to fight hard in the lightish 8 to 10 knots of breeze and claw their way to a third and fourth place finish, while Tomko struggled on the last lap and slid back to seventh. Watters and Burd seemed unable to shake the DSQ from the day before and finished the race in 8th place – still holding onto fourth overall but poised to return to B-fleet in the next series.

Going into the last day, we had hoped to run three heats to end on 12 complete races but with a deadline of 3pm for the last start, and the seabreeze refusing to fill in by 2pm, the event was concluded on the 22nd heat with 11 completed races – a very high number for a championship with boat rotations.

The facilities planned for by the Gulfport Yacht Club and provided for by the city of Gulfport, FL were absolutely outstanding for this event. The Mayor of Gulfport, FL went so far as to present Commodore Bob Feckner and the all volunteer Gulfport Yacht Club with a proclamation proclaiming Saturday April 25th, 2008 as the U.S. Multihull Chamionship for the Hobie Alter Cup day during the dinner banquet on Friday evening. The manufacturer and importer of the AHPC Capricorn F18 catamarans, Fun in the Sun, Inc and AHPC in Austrailia, provided impeccable fine tuned racing machines for this event. Fun in the Sun went so far as to, at their own expense, locate and provide a 12th boat when we had two boats damaged and in need of repair so that we would not have to end the event for the two lowest scoring teams at that point. This year we had a beach support staff of one person for every two boats and they two are largely responsible for the success of this event. In no particular order; Tim Owens, David and Robyn Strickland, Chris Zander (also taking photos), Rob “What about Rob” Van Den Enden, Greg Goodall (AHPC), Robbie Daniels (Fun in the Sun, Inc), Jill Nickerson (Fun in the Sun, Inc), Pete Pollard, and Mary Ann Robertson.

I have been honored to work with PRO Fairlie Brinkley and his on the water staff, largely from the Gulfport Yacht Club, this week. The integrity of the race management and proceedings on the water were impeccable making it easy for everyone else to do their jobs. Lastly, I would like to thank our Chief Judge, Dave Shaffer, and Judges Barb Shaffer and Ann Newton (who in my opinion have one of the most stressful jobs at an event of this caliber) for helping to make this an incredible week. We have had a terrific championship and I look forward to next year.