Delta Ditch Run Lite

This year’s Delta Ditch Run will not be remembered for carnage, dismastings, broken boats or broken records. Quite the opposite. It was pleasant, not as hot as forecast due to morning cloud cover, and a powerful flood carried racers through the wind holes.

The only possible snafu turned out to be no big deal, more of an annoyance than a race-buster. On Thursday, organizers at Stockton Sailing Club and the Yacht Racing Association were notified that, due to a schedule change, military maneuvers would be held at the naval weapons station at Port Chicago, and the restricted zone there would be enlarged to the point that it would effectively choke down the passage to a corridor too narrow for 150 sailboats to transit safely. Negotiations between the powers-that-be broadened the go-zone — provided the race committee would put boats on station to check each competitor into and out of the zone by VHF. But the radio on the check-in boat didn’t have enough range, and the whole thing was a bust. As the sailors passed Port Chicago they could see a ship at the wharf guarded by two small Coast Guard RIBs. No incidents were reported.

The light air led some of the asymmetrical boats to try winging out their spinnakers. Trying out this configuration were Gordie Nash’s modified Santana 27 Arcadia, Chris Forrest’s Santa Cruz-based, modified, sugar-scooped Cal 20 Sirena (ex-Tappo Piccolo) and a J/70. "The four crew on Sirena came up with the novel idea of free-floating the asym wing-on-wing," reports Richard vonEhrenkrook of the Cal 20 Can O’Whoopass. "They took off, easily besting the stock boats by a knot or more. And they often chose to not jibe the thing, but to just jibe the main, and go back to sailing hot and high, conventionally."

Bill Erkelens’ D-Class cat Adrenaline was first to finish at 6:42; the Farr 40 Twisted was the first monohull at 7:28. Bart Hackworth’s Gruntled, which topped the 22-boat Moore 24 fleet, corrected out to first monohull overall. We’ll have more in Racing Sheet in the July issue of Latitude 38. See the Stockton Sailing Club’s website for results.