When it comes to travelling, the Moore 24 fleet ranks with the best of them for its members’ commitment to hitching up the trailers and getting the show on the road. Sixteen Moores carried on that tradition last weekend at Huntington Lake for the class’s PCCs. One of those, Gilles Combrisson and Mark English’s Numa Boa, had a more challenging journey than the rest. Combrisson, the Pt. Richmond-based rigger picks up the story:

"We were on our way up to the PCCs a week ago Thursday, roughly 15 miles east of Madera and coasting down a hill near a cattle ranch. A pickup truck was in a dirt parking lot up ahead on the left, looking like he was getting ready to turn and drive in the opposite direction; and there was a Highway Patrol vehicle about 200-feet away, driving towards us. I kept coasting and just as we passed the pickup truck, the driver suddenly turned into us, smashing right into the trailer. I must have been going about 45 mph, so it was a massive crunch. His truck spun around from the impact, but the trailer swung hard to the right and started to topple before settling back down and swinging hard to the left. It finally came to a rest, still attached, but doing the ‘crab’, as the axle had been jammed about 40° off-center. The Highway Patrol officer drove up and started redirecting traffic, and we all got out and surveyed the damage. The patrolman was in disbelief that the boat stayed put and didn’t get dumped into the ditch on the side of the road. More CHP showed up, and then a tow truck — which promptly left after seeing what was at stake. The trailer was totalled, but the boat didn’t have a single scratch, nor did our tow vehicle; the trailer hitch ball was bent back roughly 30° from vertical. Apparently the other driver ‘just didn’t see us.’

"While all this was going on, iPhone pics were flying, there were phone calls right and left, and folks from the fleet were stopping to see what the heck had happened. We quickly determined that we really wanted to do the event, and that the only way would be to transfer the boat to a healthy trailer. The CHP got us hooked up with a towing/crane company in Madera. Meanwhile the fleet made calls and we secured the trailer from Joel Verutti’s hull #55 Mercedes as the boat was already in the water. So the plan solidified: the towing company would take the boat and trailer to their yard in Madera, and we would drive up to Huntington Lake to get Joel’s trailer; once we were an hour out of Madera, we would call the towing company and they would get their crane ready. It all worked like clockwork, and five hours after the accident, we were driving past the spot of the crash on our way up to the lake! The next day we were on the starting line, albeit a bit tired, but very happy to be there. We went on to take 5th overall after great first and second days, and a mediocre third day. The boat will vacation up there in a borrowed slip while we secure a trailer, most likely a new one."

The regatta went to Vaughn Seifers’ Richmond YC-based Flying Tiger, which finished six points clear of John Kernot’s Banditos, which in turn beat Simon Winer’s Gruntled on a countback. Seifers counted nothing higher than a fifth in the eight-race, one-throwout series. Flying Tiger racked up three bullets, two of which came in the regatta’s final races. The final results are here.