The lake was covered with hard ice, 1/4" of crust, and 1-1/2" of newly fallen snow. Saturday the wind did not cooperate, but a few sailors (well... ok, it was Jan Gougeon) were able to get around a small course in the afternoon. On Sunday we woke up to a different story. The wind speed while rigging the boats was in the 15-20 mph range, and built steadily all day from there. A few ringers from a different region came in to steal the trophies, but the local sailors didn't let it happen.
John Dennis dominated the fleet and sailed a very consistent series the win the regatta handily. JD looked like he would steal the whole show after his horizon job in the first race, but another local (Mark Christenson) showed us all how to get around the course and passed a number of boats to take the lead in the second race. Paul Goodwin finally got things tuned up and traded places with JD upwind and downwind in the third race, but a slow double tack at the last weather mark rounding cost the race for JD. Just before the start of the last race, rumour has it some enterprising sailors put some vaseline on the wind meter the race committee was using so they wouldn't notice the 30+ mph gusts!!! The last race was quite a test of courage, but JD was up to the task and once again showed his tail feathers to the rest of the fleet.
The silver fleet was hanging in through all the major gusts, but the notable event of the afternoon was the second leeward mark rounding by Rick Lemberg Jr. Rick was coming downwind at HUGE velocity and a little too close to the mark. I was standing with his father and we both noticed a little bit of directional hunting as he was setting up for the mark rounding, and we knew this was not a good thing. As Rick started a big power slide towards the mark we thought he would repeat Jan Gougeons maneuver from earlier in the day and take out the mark. Instead, next thing we saw was Rick leaving the boat at warp speed in a cloud of snow. Now most 18 year olds might want to sit the rest of the race out, but Rick jumped up, saw the mark still standing, righted his boat and got back in the race. He only let two boats get by, and managed to reel one of them back in before the finish!
Thanks go out to the organizers, the Race Committee, and all the volunteers. Dan Heaney and Debbie Goodwin were the Race Committee, and got volunteer scoring help from the sailors. This worked out well, with racing progressing smoothly to complete four races in each fleet.
Paul Goodwin - US4061
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Pos Sail# Name Race> 1 2 3 4 Points
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1 US 4691 DENNIS, JOHN 1 2 2 1 6.00
2 US 4061 GOODWIN, PAUL 5 4 1 2 12.00
3 US 4824 CHRISTENSEN, MARK 6 1 5 5 17.00
4 US 882 GOUGEON, MEADE (S) 2 5 3 7 17.00
5 US 4379 HARPER, JOHN 8 3 4 3 18.00
6 US 4055 STRUBLE, BOB (S) 4 6 7 11 28.00
7 US 4789 CLARK, CHRIS 10 13 10 4 37.00
8 US 602 MEYER, TOM 7 7 14 9 37.00
9 US 4602 KICKHAFER, DAVID 9 14 9 8 40.00
10 US 1183 GOUGEON, JAN (S) 3 DNF 11 6 46.00
11 US 4695 KIEFER, MARK 17 11 6 19 53.00
12 US 4155 LEMBERG, RICHARD 18 18 8 12 56.00
13 US 45 SHERRY, WENDELL (S) 12 15 15 14 56.00
14 US 4732 GAMBLE, TODD DNF 12 12 10 60.00
15 US 2360 JOHNS, PETE (M) 11 8 DNS 16 61.00
16 US 294 LOENNEKE, LOUIS (S) 13 10 13 DNF 62.00
17 US 781 NORTON, JOE (S) 14 9 17 DNS 66.00
18 US 4148 DIXON, TIM 19 17 16 17 69.00
19 US 2301 BIERMAN, DANIEL 21 22 20 13 76.00
20 US 5014 ISABELL, MARK 22 20 19 18 79.00
21 US 4811 CHATTERTON, MARKHAM DNF 23 18 15 82.00
22 US 805 PEGEL, JANE (M) 16 19 21 DNS 82.00
23 US 4961 DAVENPORT, JOHN 15 16 DNS DNS 83.00
24 US 4926 ORKBEKE, STEVE 20 21 22 DNF 89.00
25 US 4140 HOEPER, PETER (S) 23 24 DNS DNS 99.00
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Pos Sail# Name Race> 1 2 3 4 Points
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1 US 4889 AUSTIN, TOM 2 1 3 1 7.00
2 US 4923 LOOMIS, JOHN (S) 3 2 1 2 8.00
3 US 4950 RATLIFF, MATT 1 7 4 4 16.00
4 US 4755 LEMBERG, JR, RICK 5 6 5 3 19.00
5 US 60 SCHUGT, MIKE 4 5 9 5 23.00
6 US 244 ERWIN, TERRY (S) 8 3 2 DNF 30.00
7 US 4973 SWANSON, RON 9 8 8 6 31.00
8 US 246 ERWIN, GRAHAM (J) 7 4 6 DNF 34.00
9 US 360 BAUSCH, ELMER (M) 12 10 11 7 40.00
10 US 460 MARTINSON, BRUCE 14 12 10 9 45.00
11 US 4988 VOLKMAN, JOHN 13 9 7 DNS 46.00
12 US 4980 BALDWIN, MIKE 11 11 DNS 8 47.00
13 US 4597 SOLUM, JEFF 6 DNF DNS DNS 57.00
14 US 3865 BOWEN, TED (S) 10 DNF DNS DNS 61.00
15T US 4695 KIEFER, SAM (J) DNS DNS DNS DNS 68.00
16T US 1830 CASTELLI, FRANCIS (M) DNF DNS DNS DNS 68.00