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November 15, 2013

Latitude 38 Photo Contest

This is a photo of a very frustrated Jane Roy of the Portland-based Columbia 43 Adios. She’s not frustrated because of the sailing conditions on the Ha-Ha, because for the second year in a row she and her guy Craig Shaw had one of the few boats that sailed the entire time of each of the three legs. She’s not frustrated because of the weather in Cabo, because it’s much warmer than in her native Canada and Portland. So the photo quiz is, why is she frustrated? Hint: What’s she holding in her right hand? Email Richard with your answers.

 

Jimmy & Shannon Bound for the BVI

We don’t normally hype stand-up paddle boarding events in far-flung destinations, but this year the British Virgin Island’s annual Painkiller Cup definitely has a West Coast hook. Adopted sons of San Francisco Jimmy Spithill and Shannon Falcone — key members of the winning Oracle Team USA America’s Cup team — have confirmed that they’ll attend this year’s event, slated to take place January 25.

As if America’s Cup workouts weren’t exercise enough, Shannon (left) and Jimmy took an early morning spin around the Bay with SUP star Chase Kosterlitz.

© 2013 Erik Simonson

Organized by longtime BVI event promoter Andy Morrell, the Cup’s 14-mile course runs from Trellis Bay (adjacent to the BVI’s international airport), west through the Guana Island cut, along the north shore of Tortola and across the potentially rough five-mile channel to Jost Van Dyke island’s idyllic White Bay, home of the Soggy Dollar Bar. The Painkiller cocktail was invented there by Daphne Henderson in the late ’70s. 

The route is to be run by three-person teams, one of whom must be female. Paddlers will rotate on and off their board — in open water — every 30 minutes. Unlike most Caribbean sailing regattas, the Painkiller Cup offers at least $10,000 in prize money, with half of that going to the top team. A three-mile Mini-Painkiller Cup event will also be run for less-adventurous paddlers, with a course from Sandy Cay to the Soggy Dollar Bar. 

Chase and another top-flight SUPer show their winning offshore form. The crossing from Tortola to Jost can be daunting.

© 2013 HIHO

As remarkable as Spithill and Falcone are as sailors, achieving podium finishes in this event won’t be easy. Among the competition will be Chase Kosterlitz (top-ranked U.S. racer), Belar Diaz (top Spanish racer), and Kai Lenny (the Hawaiian watersports whiz who raced the AC72s with his kiteboard on San Francisco Bay. Many amateurs from the U.S., Caribbean and elsewhere will also participate.

In conjunction with Spithill and Falcone’s BVI visit, the sailing-oriented Bitter End YC resort will hold a special HIHO Bitter End America’s Cup Party, Thursday, January 23. There, we assume, mere mortals will have a chance to rub shoulders and drink rum with Jimmy and Shannon. Exact details are TBA, but if you’re going to be in that part of the Caribbean in late January, you won’t want to miss it. Who knows, we might even show up ourselves. 

Sun, fun, exercise and prize money too. The Painkiller Cup’s purse is sure to attract plenty of talent.

© 2013 HIHO

Classy Deadline Today

Once again, the holiday season is upon us. If your reaction to that statement was ‘Oh crap!’ instead of ‘Oh joy!’, maybe it’s time to clean out your dock box and lazarettes to earn a few extra bucks for shopping. Whether you want to list a boat or a room full of gear, a Classy Classified ad will get lots of qualified eyeballs.

Ooh! Just what I was looking for!

latitude/LaDonna
© Latitude 38 Media, LLC

"Psh! I know that," you say. Great! Then you’ll also know that today is the deadline to get your ad in the December issue of Latitude 38. You must get your ad in by 5 p.m. — not 5:30, not Monday — to get it in the magazine, but no matter when you order an ad, it will be online within a business day or so (usually sooner). So start digging around and you might get some extra cash and make someone else’s holiday just a little happier.

The World’s Most Valuable Free Boat Ad?

Someone forwarded us a copy of Marc Myers’ June 6 interview with 71-year-old singer/songwriter/mind-altering-substance abuser David Crosby. Boomers know him as a founding member of The Byrds and Crosby, Stills & Nash, and as being in the center of 1970s rock ‘n roll. In the interview, Crosby, a proud ‘bad boy’ recounts his sailing history and how important sailing is to him. He got his start at age 11 on an eight-foot dinghy in Santa Barbara as his parents were hoping to get him into "something besides trouble." He broke the rules by sailing beyond the limits, as might be expected, and was kicked out of the program, just as he was kicked out of several schools. He describes himself as a natural sailor who didn’t need to be told what to do, and singlehanding the little boat as a "transforming experience."

Crosby’s Alden schooner, Mayan.

Mayan
©2013 Latitude 38 Media, LLC

It was 15 years later, after co-founding The Byrds, that Crosby got back into sailing. After being thrown out of the band, he borrowed $25,000 from Peter Tork of The Monkees to purchase the 74-ft John Alden schooner Mayan. Within a year, he became a full-time live aboard in San Francisco, which lasted for a couple of years. The wooden schooner, he says, became his muse and was the inspiration for, you guessed it, ‘Wooden Ships’ and other famous Crosby compositions. He claims that over the years everyone who is anyone in rock ‘n roll was aboard. For his reputation as a world class party animal, Crosby says that partying is "pallid" when compared to sailing. After 1970, Mayan spent much of her time in Santa Barbara, a winch handle’s throw from Brophy’s Seafood Restaurant.

It’s a little hard to believe, but Crosby says that while he, his wife Jan and son Django go sailing every chance they can, he hasn’t been able to keep up with the boat’s mortgage and other expenses. Although Mayan‘s been on the market for years, Crosby says his wife would "break his arm" if he sold the boat.

Crosby, who admits to suffering from hepatitis C, diabetes and heart disease, says he figures he’s got 10 years left, and has one big dream. It’s one more tour with Stills, Nash and Young, which would give him enough money to go sailing again. "And I’d be happy," he says.

Electrical fires account for more than half of all boat fires. © 2013 Rob Murray It’s that time of year again, folks.
On Tuesday night, British co-skippers Ned Collier Wakefield and Sam Goodchild’s Class 40 Concise 8 suffered damage to its port rudder so the duo decided to retire from the 20th running of the Transat Jacques Vabre.