April 2, 2002

By Grzegorz | April 2, 2002

Photo of the Day

April 2 – Los Angeles

Start ’em young!
Today’s Captain of the Day is 15-month-old Spencer Underwood,
who was recently spotted at the helm of The Bill of Rights
out of Los Angeles.

Photo Devan Mullin

The Catana Could Have Been a Contender

April 2 – The Atlantic Ocean

About a week ago we reported that a group of French professional
sailors were going to see how fast they could sail the brand
new and stock – complete with air conditioning and washing machine
– Catana 582 catamaran from New York to France. Alas, after about
four days of rough weather, they had to turn back. We don’t know
exactly why because it’s hard to read their Website, but we think
it was because they ripped the clew out of their main in winds
up to 50 knots, and later irreparably damaged their genoa in
high winds. The crew is stopping in Bermuda on their way back
to New York, at which time they will apparently restart.

Photo Courtesy www.catana-live.com/fr/

Update: Thanks to Joseph Oster, here’s
a bit of the Catana’s log when they were doing well: “The
boat is absolutely perfect. It’s incredible how safe we feel
aboard this catamaran. When we were surfing down the waves in
gusts of wind, we got close to 33 knots, and crashed more than
once in the wave that was in front of us. But thanks to the volume
of the bows, Saint Nicolas always got out well.”

Cats are great, but they are weakest when having to sail to weather
in strong winds. In those cases, it’s usually prudent to dramatically
slow the boat down to reduce the loads – and most of all make
it safe for the crew. Just ask ‘Commodore’ Tompkins, who just
delivered Profligate back to California from Puerto Vallarta.

Maxi Monohull Level Racing

April 2 – The World

Remember when Santa Cruz 70s had near level
racing in the TransPac? The days of little boats have gone, now
that Roy Disney and Bob McNeil have started working with Bill
Lee to develop a level class rule for 86-footers. McNeil’s new
boat, the R/P 86 Zephyrus V will debut on San Francisco
Bay later this month, while Disney – currently kicking butt with
his current R/P 75-footer in the Caribbean – is looking for a
builder for his new R/P 86.

“Our vision is to create a competitive class of purpose-built
racing yachts for the world’s great offshore events,” Lee
told Keith Taylor. “Multihulls and larger yachts may at
times be faster. However, this is a vision of creating not just
one large fast boat, but a class of large fast boats that can
race one another on a level basis without a time allowance –
in many cases for course records.”
The new boats will be modern turbo sleds, in that they will be
easily driven, have sail plans bigger than America’s Cup boats,
and carry nearly six tons of water ballast when sailing upwind.
If three such boats sign up, they’ll be allowed to race in the
2005 TransPac.

Mystery Schooner Identified!

April 2 – Antigua

Photo Jim Drake

“I believe the mystery schooner in
your March 27 ‘Lectronic
about the Antigua Classic Regatta is Ashanti of Vegisak,”
writes Valerie Hoskin of the Long Beach based Valerie K.
“She was on the west coast a few years ago, and my husband
Ron and I had the pleasure of getting a tour from the crew. We
repaid them later with a champagne cruise around Alamitos Bay
in a classic barrel-back speed boat. As Emma said from the back
seat, ‘It sets off a wonderful vibration!’ By the way, thank
you for the link to YOTREPS, as it allow us to keep track of
our friends Paul & Mary aboard the Tayana 37 Aventura.”

Orange Still In One Piece

April 2 – The Southern Ocean

All the way across the Indian Ocean, Bruno
Peyron and his crew have been beset by the most inhospitable
Southern Ocean weather any of them have experienced. And just
today, they admitted that four days ago Orange started
suffering from delamination.
“The aft beam fairing 2.5 meters from the port hull had
delaminated in the area that gets the onslaught of the waves
– rather like what they experienced on Team Adventure
in The Race, but less serious,” reported Peyron. “Add
to that two cracked bulkheads in this impact zone. It all must
have happened when we were pushing a bit too hard in the crossed
seaway on the continental shelf to the south of Africa and beating
just before the Kerguelens”.

Happily, it wasn’t as serious as it first seemed, because the
damage was quickly found during one of the systematic check-ups
of each part of the boat. It was the composite wizard, Yves Le
Blevec, who noticed it from the access to the aft beam from inside
of the video room in the port hull. “In fact, the honeycomb
core had collapsed due to the slamming of the waves,” explained
Philippe Péché who assisted Yves with the repairs.
“Then, the inner and outer skins started to peel and little
fibres of carbon were even beginning to hang on the outside of
the beam. But thankfully it wasn’t too serious because we noticed
the problem in time; but it’s clear, if we hadn’t noticed it,
it could have become much more serious!”

Despite the bad conditions and the boat problems, Orange
is still about 2,000 miles ahead of Sport Elec‘s Jules
Verne record pace.

Yelapa and Fat Thighs

April 2 – Mexico

“Since Yelapa is one of the current
topics in ‘Lectronic,” writes Lonnie Spencer of a Palo Alto
and Puerto Escondido-based Newport 30, “I wonder if you
know about Maggie Stites? She is a wonderful woman who spent
years volunteering in the Palo Alto schools when her children
were there. Maggie is all about justice, equality and peace.
As she began to lose her sight some 25 years ago, she decided
somehow that Yelapa was to be her home. She lives humbly behind
the beach, and has a lovely little book of poetry for sale. If
anyone goes there, ask for Maggie, la gringa ciega.

“On the topic of surviving hypothermia, a woman who swims
daily in the Bay tells me that through constant exposure, one
gradually builds up permanent extracutaneous fat which offers
protection from exposure. I’ll bet those guys who survived for
3.5 hours in an overturned fishing boat were from Duluth. Back
in the ’60s, I remember reading that New York women who insisted
on wearing mini-skirts in winter were getting fat thighs due
to this effect.”

The Crew of Wild Wild West at Yelapa
Photo Latitude/Richard

YOTREPS

April 2 – The Pacific Ocean and Cyberspace

Who is out making passages in the Pacific
and what kind of weather are they having? Check out YOTREPS –
‘yacht reports’ – at http://www.bitwrangler.com/yotreps/

Weather Updates

April 2 – Pacific Ocean

San Francisco Bay Weather

To see what the winds are like on the Bay
and just outside the Gate right now, check out http://sfports.wr.usgs.gov/wind/.
The National Weather Service site for San Francisco Bay has moved
to www.wrh.noaa.gov/Monterey/.

California Coast Weather

Looking for current as well as recent wind
and sea readings from 17 buoys and stations between Pt. Arena
and the Mexican border? Here’s the place – which has further
links to weather buoys and stations all over the U.S.: www.ndbc.noaa.gov/stuff/southwest/swstmap.shtml.

Pacific Winds and Pressure

The University of Hawaii Dept. of Meteorology
page posts a daily
map of the NE Pacific Ocean barometric pressure and winds.

Pacific Sea State

Check out the Pacific Ocean sea states
at: http://www.mpc.ncep.noaa.gov/RSSA/PacRegSSA.html.

For another view, see http://www.oceanweather.com/data/global.html.

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