Team Seacats

At almost exactly 6pm Team Bugaboo hit the beach to a hearty round of what we here in the South like to call whoopin’ and hollerin’. Seacats Orange and Royal Yellow, who have been sling-shotting and duking it out by turns all day long, are next up and in view from the beach.

How do I know all this? Well, the surfside applause part was because I was on the phone with our team manager Tim Owens during the first beach landing of the 2010 Tybee 500 in beautiful Hollywood Florida. The why and how of how I followed the race all day from the comfort of my home back here in South Carolina is that I spent the day checking in with the live tracking provided on the Tybee 500 web site. According to their places on the map at the top of the hour, it looks like Seacats Adrenaline were in 5th place around Miami Beach while Seacats White were in 7th and still at Key Biscayne.

I would heartily encourage you all to play along at home as well and not spend your time waiting for me to supply you with the trickle down theory of catamaran race coverage. Like the original theory of that name, it is an inherently flawed manner to expect anything of real value to be received by the truly needy. My goodness, in the time it takes me to write this, post it, and then for you to patiently sift through it, things have undoubtedly changed in one or several very important ways.

Here’s what I want you to do tomorrow at 10am: Make some popcorn. Open a beer. Make an event out of it, as it is indeed a sailing event. This plan should probably be undertaken only if you happen to work from home. If that’s not you then I would advise clearing it with your boss first. Tip: Offer him a beer before asking to spend the day watching live tracking and posting comments on Catsailor. Tell him I said it was all good. Watching the little icons move today upon each page refresh, I felt so voyeuristic, so powerful, so very in-the-know. This must be the way the race looks to God every year when He watches it. Only He can prolly hear them as well, mostly shouting and swearing, and so turns the volume waaay down.

Rick White, from Catsailor (both a cyber place as well as a being the name of an equally fabulous magazine) will be covering the event this year. He is the O.G. of  Tybee coverage, so bow down. There will be photos and daily reports on the site for your amusement and perusal, as well as lots of information, analysis, and scuttlebutt to be found on the site’s forums.

I’m not certain if I’ll be posting much at all this year as my ramblings have been made extra unnecessary due to all of the other fine team coverage that continues to sprout up every year. Well, that and the fact that I’m not physically present at the event. That’s just the tiniest bit of a handicap. Whatta dorkus. I wanted to go and had planned to do so but I thought we were leaving next (that is, the now upcoming) weekend and so didn’t have my ducks in a row, work-wise.

No big loss for you though, our most wonderful and loyal armchair Tybee fans, as there are links to both individual web sites and blogs from other teams that can be found on the official Tybee 500 race site. Hell, the RC is even Tweeting this year. Holla! So I’m sitting here with my old, whiny dog wishing I had my tootsies in the warm Florida sand instead. C’est la vie. C’est la guerre. I wish everyone the best. If you miss me, or have any questions I can answer about our three Seacats teams, Medieval history, or Postmodern critical theory, then feel free to contact me via bonnie at teamseacats dot com.

Update: Apparently, some of the tracking stats were faulty, or some teams’ little icons were disappearing into the Hollywood Triangle or something. In any case, Seacats Orange was in 4th place instead of 2nd. Still, not too shabby for the first day on a boat where the guys barely sail together more than once a year. They were still the second place boat in the I-20 fleet. See how incorrect and obsolete I’ve been rendered by a combination of technology and its inevitable glitches coupled with the inability to astrally project myself to a beach in Florida?

Tybee coverage is going to be light here at teamseacats this year because my gorgeous and talented wife wasn’t able to join us owing to being challenged by concepts regarding the space/time continuum as it relates to daily life on the planet Earth.

The official Tybee 500 website should have good coverage including live boat tracking! You may want to check in with other teams’ coverage/blogs as well. Their links can also be found on the Tybee  500 site. Also be sure to follow Rick White’s news and photos every day over at Catsailor.

Note: Jake was not the author of this entire post. He usually calls his wife “beautemous” as opposed to merely gorgeous, or so I’ve been told. Regards, Housekeeping…just dropping off some extra towels.