The rousing presentation by J Rosenbach, Bodacious, Jeff Landers, Spar Trek, and Peter Nelson, Time Warp, to SSSS in May tempted many members to attend the Summer Camp for Adults. What the presenters said about the local hospitality, level of competition and weather conditions was true!
Would I do it again ... you bet!
Erik Dahl, SSSS Race Chair and skipper of Miss Conduct, put the word out that he wanted to go and would any of the SSSS old-timers want to join him? They did, see the article on The Over the Hill Gang below. They were joined by J Rosenbach on Bodacious, Gary Pedigo on Charlemagne, and Joseph Donnette skippering Gayle Force which is owned by Jim Philips. Each of these boats was in a different class as over 100 boats, the smallest being two new 22 ft Rockets from Canada to a couple of Big Boys in the 50 foot range, were in Oak Harbor to strut their stuff.
Those two 22 ft Rockets were in the same class as Miss Conduct and in spite of the Miss Conduct crew’s effort to misbehave we just couldn’t touch those amazingly fast and manoverable skiffs. They would come tearing down on port tack in front of all the larger boats in their class, wait for us to holler “starboard” and zip, they tacked right in front of you. This of course would cause every one on the line to come up and added to the excitement, read as yelling and screaming %#@$$, as all racers fought for the starting line.
Charlemagne was the most aggressive of the Olympia boats, having been protested once and called over early twice. The over-earlys were to be announced by the committee boat but that didn’t happen and Charlemagne had to give up the first to finish in one race. Gary said he did Race Week to get away from work, relax and have some fun. The tension surrounding the protest hearings surely made some highs and lows for him and his crew. I don’t know if Gray relaxed much but he went home with a big smile on his face. We all knew that he was not thinking about the stock market while he attended his summer camp this year.
Gayle Force had a real exciting day on the fourth day of the race. We should note that beside the skipper they took up four Melges rookies as crew. Like the rest of us they got their trial under fire that first day with winds into the 30s. They were improving each day. On the four day they were in position just in front of the other Melges and having a jibing duel to stay on top of their fleet. Just 30 feet from the finish line and out of nowhere the Z buoy appeared. In executing yet another jibe they caught the buoy anchor line around their keel. Since the Z was not a mark of their course they decide to take it with them to that finish line which is now only twenty feet away ... Well in the process of bringing the buoy aboard the boat the anchor line snaked its way around the skipper’s leg. It pulled him overboard and sent him to the hospital to have his ankle checked out. Joseph proudly relates that they made up for this stealing the buoy technique the next day when they were first to the first windward mark.
J Rosenbach was the mentor for all Olympia sailors as he and his crew had completed Race Week before. He had lots of tips to get us started. J and his crew and families camped the week at the conveniently located Oak Harbor Park. It is reported that he and his crew ate the best. Everything from fresh bar-be-qued salmon to ribs and finger licking squawkers were on their menu.
Most of the Olympia crew members were bacheloring so if there was a home cooked meal it was a bowl of cereal for breakfast and maybe a peanut butter sandwich for lunch. We would drop in on the Race Week Headquarters’ activities every night and have a beer or two but most of the Olympia boys just enjoyed the stories and entertainment.
I suppose you want to hear more ... just ask one of us or check it out next year for yourself.
We considered the Gang of Five and even the Misbehavers as names for the old-timers from South Sound Sailing Society who climbed the age curve to attend Whidbey Island Race Week 2005. We settled on the Over the Hill Gang. I must admit that the description of Summer Camp for Adults got our attention and when Erik Dahl put out the word that he was looking for crew it didn’t take long for us to make the commitment.
We started early. After all “practice, practice” is the secret to success, right? In our case it was a matter of survival. On three successive Mondays evenings different combinations of us got together to get to know Miss Conduct. She is a 29 foot Olson. Except for the skipper none of us had ever stepped foot on her. Well, you can imagine ... here were all these experienced skippers who have taught younger folks for the last 30 to 40 years and had not been on a foredeck since their own youth. We tried to raise the spinnaker, being experience skippers we knew handling the kite was the toughest job we had to master. Well, all these Masters couldn’t even get it up at first. And when we did you should have seen the mess when we tried our first jibe.
It was a good thing that we did learn to get the spinnaker up as the first day of Whidbey Race Week we had more wind than we usually get here in the South Sound, 24 knots out of the south building a good chop up in Saratoga Passage with wind gusts up into the 30s. Our advantage was the weight of the crew, and of course experience. Our disadvantage was the slow moving and creaking joints of the Gang. There was enough wind and a long course so we didn’t know how we finished. In fact we were not sure we had completed the right course. When it was all said and done the skipper had to pay off a bet to the crew that we were not in last place. We had our best finish of the week; sixth out of 12 boats.
Tuesday through Thursday the weather cooperated and there were two races each day. The wind had filled in from the west so the race course was in Penn Cove, just off of Coupeville. In each race it became a challenge to keep your eye on your game rather than all the boats, the shows that they were putting on, so you could keep track of the competition and stay close to the committee boat to get the course. Normally in South Sound we get out to the start line maybe a half hour early. We usually know where the start line is going to be so no big deal. While up there we had to get out early just to find the start line ... and believe me it doesn’t help that our eyesight is not so good anymore.
The last day was the longest. With only one race scheduled we thought we would be back early and get an early start on the traffic. That was not to be. The wind decided to play with us. The Race Committee took a long time setting the line and when we thought we were off ... bang, the delay flag would go up. We even had time to sail over to the Coupeville dock and check out the latté offerings. Finally, the westerly firmed up and we had the great exciting race. The legs were shorter than early in the week but more of them so there was a lot more tacking, jibing and sail changes.
Actually the Gang was getting pretty good by this time. We had figured out and could remember our jobs, built a lot of team trust, labeled all lines so we didn’t have to memorize them, made sure each of us had put on our sun screen before leaving the dock, secured our hats and glasses and had the binoculars handy.
We loved it. We flew the spinnaker most of the way back to Oak Harbor for our final dinner together. The crew in this adventure was: Roger Carnes, 62, Jim Lengenfelder, 63, Steve Sischo, 63, Tom Fell, 67, Bill Sheldon, 68, and skipper and winner of the crew awarded Golden Skipper Award, Erik Dahl, 67.
Jim Lengenfelder, String Games
We want to note that Shattered was also at Race Week. She did well. Results of all SSSS boats are in this S-t-S, at least all those I recognised. If I missed someone, please let me know.
Ed.