Racing

By Christian E. Hoffman MIDN USN, Varsity Offshore Sailing Team Captain Being the skipper of a service academy racing yacht, particularly on the United States Naval Academy Varsity Offshore Sailing Team (VOST), provides both challenges and hardships, but results in incredible reward. Each summer VOST crews depart from Annapolis, MD in vessels ranging from a Reichel/Pugh 66 to Navy 44s. Whether you are competing in an offshore distance race from Marion to Bermuda or buoy racing in…

By Nick Bowen The Twenty Hundred Club is a vibrant and growing sailboat racing club on Narragansett Bay that has a wide range of races including island circumnavigations, destination races and pure adventure races (spoiler alert – “Twenty Hundred [hours]” refers to the starting time of the club’s first race in 1946). The club is experiencing a growth spurt, with 60 boats participating in the 2018 season.   The season begins with the Around Aquidneck Island [Newport]…

Anderson Reggio, described by our friend and regular contributor Sam Crichton as “Newport’s Go-To Sailing Professional” in an article she wrote for NewportThisWeek.com, checks a lot of boxes for WindCheck Magazine. He could easily be an On Watch candidate as he hails from “The WindCheck Community.” He could write a Sound Environment column drawing on his environmental experiences and as an Ambassador for Newport-based 11th Hour Racing. For this regular feature of our interviews with New York…

By Robyn Earley, J/Fest New England Publicity and Marketing Chair   The third annual New England J/Fest Regatta was hosted by Sail Newport the weekend of August 9-11, 2019 in the beautiful waters of Narragansett Bay. This regatta was open to all J/Boat owners and crews in both racing and cruising classes. The one-design classes included both J/109s and J/80s, with an equally competitive PHRF class. Narragansett Bay is considered a special “home waters” venue for the New…

By Tricia Walsh     Stonington Harbor Yacht Club in Stonington, CT hosted the 18th Annual Red Lobdell Regatta on Saturday, July 27. Twenty-eight boats competed across six classes on a beautiful day with an SSE wind at 5-7 knots. There were three racing circles: Big Boats raced around Fishers Island (an Eastern Connecticut Sailing Association points race), Medium Boats (which included the Watch Hill 15s) raced outside the outer breakwater, and Small Boats competed inside Stonington…

By Don Watson, Regatta Chair    The 47th annual Buzzards Bay Regatta, held on August 2-4, provided three days of sunshine filled racing for 3 classes of kite boards, seven one-design classes, 2 PHRF classes and one NEMA multihull class. Shields and J/80s raced in the waters off Marion, MA, hosted by Beverly Yacht Club. The F18 catamarans, Melges 20s, 5O5s, Laser Masters, Marshall Sandpipers, Kiteboards (including AV8, Foil and Leading Edge), PHRF Race and Multihulls raced…

By Barby MacGowan, Media Pro International Light air became a challenge for racers and organizers at this year’s Edgartown Race Weekend, hosted by Edgartown Yacht Club in Edgartown, MA July 25 – 29, but the show went on for all to enjoy on Martha’s Vineyard.   The event’s most illustrious of three components – a 56-mile ’Round-the-Island (RTI) race that has been a New England racing tradition for 81 years now – started Saturday, July 27 in barely-there breezes…

By Ben Cesare On June 1 and 2, twenty brand-new Melges IC37s, 131 amateur sailors, a team of coaches from North Sails, the team from Melges Performance Sailboats, and the team from New York Yacht Club who were responsible for getting the boats in the water and ready to sail, gathered at Sail Newport in Newport, RI for an inaugural “training weekend.” Class President Phil Lotz welcomed all, thanked all who had made it possible and then…

  Shifty, gusty northwesterly breezes proved challenging for the six international teams contesting New York SailGP in the waters of New York, New York on June 21 & 22, delighting the wildly cheering crowds on the waterfront at Brookfield Place in Battery Park City. Team representing the United States, Australia, China, France, Great Britain and Japan did battle in this third event of the inaugural SailGP season. The Japan SailGP Team, led by double Olympic medalist helmsman…

By Sam Crichton Newport, Rhode Island dialed up chamber of commerce weather for the final day of racing at the 17th C. Thomas Clagett, Jr. Memorial Clinic and Regatta, hosted by Sail Newport June 18 – 23.  The day started out with the predicted Northwest breeze, which was steady at around 10 knots until it dropped out causing the race committee to abandon the very last race.     Sailors from across North America, as afar afield as Alberta,…