Team Seacats

Overall, it was a good start for the teams today. They left the beach in two heats, one minute apart and based on yesterday’s finish times. Of course, all the boats are being judged on corrected time between the two classes so finish times into Hollywood (or those during any other leg) aren’t necessarily representative of the actual statistics.

It was a spinnaker start with a good breeze coming from the South Southeast and will clock around to a South wind for the remainder of the day. It should be a fast ride up to Jupiter. Team Royal Green bumped into Seacats Orange at the bow and then at the stern like a pair of bumper cars. There was not enough contact to cause damage, thankfully, and the guys were trying to physically push each other apart. By the time I left the beach, the favored starters Team Royal Yellow seemed to have the lead with another boat bearing down on them hard. My guess is that it was Whike or Magic Marine. One boat (unknown, but it may have been one of the Velocity teams) flipped shortly after the start but was righted within a few minutes and they are back running behind the pack.

An update on the mishaps yesterday: Todd of Catfever apparrently bumped his noggin during his dismount off the high side of the boat when they flipped in the surf. Todd Riccardi of Team Adrenalin may have gotten too big for his britches when he blew out the heinie of his harness. Jake of Seacats Orange also has a smallish split in his harness but is sailing with it today before considering the purchase of a new one. Fingers crossed that works out okay. Karl Langefeld of Stray Cats wasn’t the only on to split their kite yesterday but they managed to have it repaired overnight at a local shop. Now that’s good customer service.  They were going to borrow our spare if worse came to worse. I’m not certain what Royal Orange fixed their torn spinnaker but, between their four teams, they were mosy likely prepared for that possibility.

See you in Jupiter, boys and girls!

Ater a fantastic dinner last night at Morada Bay Cafe, we shot back to the hotel room where the guys took care of the last minute preparations such as filling their Camelbacks water systems, programming GPS coordinates, and contending with general pre-race hubbub. Our guys, and probably all the team, were antsy to get the show on the road, or on the water, more like.

I have to apologize for spacing out that this first leg is to Hollywood and not Jupiter as I sorta inferred yesterday. Though I will be pleased to find myself at the Jupiter Beach Resort (http://www.jupiterbeachresort.com/), the last several Tybee 500′s have begun set-up and the first day of the race by sailing south for a round trip sail to Fowey Rocks. It’s a lovely hotel as well. They have a great spa, though I don’t believe I’ll have time to patronize that establishment today!

Let me stop for a moment to say that I have been texting so often lately (Hi Kar!) that it’s making it difficult to type normally. I don’t have to simultaneously hit alt to make a period, contractions (dont) don’t automatically fix themselves, and holding down the key for a second longer doesn’t turn the letter into an upper case…it only makes for a line of the same letter, which iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii find very confusing at this point. It’s harshing my flow, in the parlance of our times.

Back to the reason for the season: It was a good and steady start on the water this morning. No one seemed to walk away from the pack. As it was such a long line, a couple of teams (Team Seacats Orange, Team Chums,  JC and Carrie, that I know of) were over the line early, or at least thought they might have been and so some corrected themselves.

The breeze is steady out of the South Southeast which will give the boys a chance at a hearty spinnaker run up to Hollywood, approximately 85 miles away. Photos will be forthcoming, as Bjorn has a much better zoom. That’s all for now. Speak to you again up the road.

This video is a little longer than I usually post – but it’s awesome. Enjoy.

Some video from the A-cat event in Florida a couple of weeks ago…nice.

A-Cats at Ft Myers from Fly Rod on Vimeo.

Up this week?  A video shot by one of our good friends Brian Karr with www.adventureonline.tv as he filmed David Ingram leaving his wife to fend for herself on his Nacra F18 while he saves his hat.  We also get to see a really great angle of Scott and Dior Huble drive their Hobie Tiger into the deep.