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Another Wild Weekend

In the 8 a.m. hour it was already breeze-on for the competitors in the Singlehanded Farallones Race on Saturday. Here, Chris Lewis’s Catalina 42 Carmelita splashes through a wave on the way out the Gate.

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© Latitude 38 Media, LLC

With the first start at 8 a.m. you’d think the racers in the Singlehanded Farallones could at least get out the Gate on the ebb without struggling against big wind and bouncy chop. But no such luck; the day was windy from start to finish. Most competitors reefed their mains, some deeply so, and deployed small jibs or partially furled genoas. Seeing the writing on the wall (actually the weather forecast), 10 of the 38 solo sailors signed up didn’t show up. Of the 28 who did venture out, five dropped out. One more started at the wrong club (St. Francis Yacht Club instead of Golden Gate) and was thus scored DNS. The round yellow buoys off those two neighboring clubs do look a lot alike when you’re alone and have your hands full. We’ll have the story and results in the June issue of Latitude 38.

Ralph Morganstern’s Dehler 34 Geodesic III is practically airborne on a wave — inside the Bay!

latitude/Chris
© Latitude 38 Media, LLC

Chris Ray, a photographer and volunteer at StFYC, was all set to take pictures of the US Match Racing Championship Area G Qualifier, held on Saturday and Sunday in the club’s J/22s. "Congratulations to the race committee and judges for getting the regatta in at all given a really strange weekend of weather — 30 knots of breeze at Anita Rock at 6 a.m. Sunday morning? Whoa. I understand we didn’t have a lot of breakage, which we certainly could have had, and that injuries were minor, thank heaven," he reports. "There was too much wind to safely drone," he adds.

The winning crew, left to right: Dana Riley, Karen Loutzenheiser, Nicole Breault and Molly Carapiet. Note that this was not a women’s event. The other crews were either coed or all-male. Some included youth sailors.

© 2018 Chris Ray

Nicole Breault and her crew won all but one of their seven races to top the leaderboard over seven other teams.

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Last week, Ernest Galvan sent us this photo, promoting a pop DIY quiz: "This is a combination DIY," wrote Ernest Galvan.
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Avid Bay Area racer, Helmut ‘Willi’ Zarth is this month’s winner of Latitude 38 logowear.