Corinthian Midwinters/Robgatta

"They put a quart into a pint pot," said Ian Matthew of Saturday’s Corinthian Midwinter race (we’ll leave it to your imagination to supply the English accent). "We spent the afternoon in Raccoon Strait." Matthew’s C&C 29 Siento el Viento was just one of dozens that couldn’t make it around the 10.5-mile course, which went from the start/finish line west of Angel Island to Southampton Shoal on the island’s east side  — against one hell of an ebb — to the Yellow Bluff buoy off the Sausalito headlands. Everyone was given the same course, and, for the later-starting, slower boats, it was a disaster. After spending the better part of the day trying to go the wrong way on the conveyor belt in Raccoon Strait, they got swept out to the North Tower of the Golden Gate Bridge.

The series started on January 16-17 and concluded on February 20-21, with the February Saturday race doing double duty as the fourth annual Rob Moore Memorial Regatta, with special prizes awarded that evening in the Corinthian’s beautiful ballroom.

Sunday’s race was postponed waiting for the promised westerly to fill, which it did, right on schedule according to what the race committee called "several high-price forecasts." While many entries failed to show up for the final day of the two-weekend regatta, almost all who did finished Sunday’s 12-mile course, which was shortened for the Cal 20s.

We’ll have more in the March issue of Latitude 38, out on Tuesday, March 1; in the meantime, check out www.cyc.org.