July 16, 2003

Photos of the Day: TransPac

July 16 – Honolulu, Hawaii

Some of our Esteemed Editors are on rough
duty over in Hawaii covering the end of the TransPac. They have
forwarded today’s Photos of the Day to make us all jealous and
show us how hard they are working.

With Illusion having crossed the finish line,
co-owner Stan Honey shakes Skip Allan’s hand in congratulations. Each member of the afterguard – “we have no crew” – has won a TransPacific race with a Cal 40. Jon Andron with Argonaut; Skip Allan with Holiday Too;
and co-owners Stan Honey and Sally Lindsay with Illusion in
the Pacific Cup. Stan also won a Singlehanded TransPac with Illusion.

Mark Rudiger, navigator of Pegasus,
with wife Lorie and their son. Having just done a stellar job
of navigating Zaraffa to a record in the TransAtlantic
Race, he had to rush back to guide Pegasus across the
Pacific. Rudiger is a humble guy who thinks before he speaks,
but he said upon review of the race that they’d made all the
right moves and sailed a nearly perfect race. “That’s only
happened to me once before,” he said, “and, ironically,
we lost that one.”

Philippe Kahn and Shark, his 13-year-old son. Having sailed in this third TransPac, fellow crewmembers said of Shark
that they can now rely on him to do the right thing at the right
time, like the other members of the crew.

The fun meters on most boats ended up on high in this TransPac. Only a few boats had rough weather, as many of
them never saw more than 18 knots of wind. Jay Crum of the victorious
Alta Vita said they never saw a squall during the entire
race.

The crew of Bill Turpin’s Santa Cruz-based
TransPac 52 Alta Vita after finishing in the wee hours of Monday night to take corrected time honors in the fleet. They nipped Karl Kwok’s Hong Kong-based TransPac 52 Beau Geste,
sailed by Gavin Brady, new skipper for Oracle BMW, and a bunch
of Kiwi Around the World racers. Northern California boats did
extremely well.
All Photos Latitude/Richard

A
classic shot of the Diamond Head finish of the TransPac. You’ve got Illusion, which wiped out the others in the Cal 40 class, surfing a wave past the finish line, which is just outside the buoy in a line with the light.
The boat in the foreground is the ESPN film crew.

Pam Coryell, Kirby Coryell, Neil Weinberg, and Neil’s lady celebrate the fact that Kirby and Neil sailed Kirby’s Tayana 52 Beach Music to second place in the
Doublehanded Division. “Of course,” Kirby laughs, “there were only two boats in the division, but who is counting. I really enjoyed the TransPac,” he said, “but I’ve never
had
so much fun in my life as in the Baja Ha-Ha. Really! We can’t wait for the end of October.

Richard and Sheri Crowe of the communications boat Alaska Eagle play around in the windscoop. Sheri was the
skipper for this leg. The boat continues on to the South Pacific and Antartica.

With more than half the boats having arrived, the action in the Ala Wai Yacht Harbor is really heating up. The junior sailors run the shuttle between the Hawaii and Waikiki Yacht Clubs. This one almost did the splits with the
dock line.

Bill
Turpin, Alta Vita‘s owner, stands in the
background while one of his crew let’s the bubbly fly in celebration of overall honors.

Other fun facts: Winner Alta Vita
carried the same half-ounce chute for their entire chute-carrying
time. According to Jay Crum, they jibed about a dozen times.
Illusion, on the other hand, jibed about 50 times. Each
time required that all four of their crew come on deck.

There will, of course, be more coverage
of the TransPac in the upcoming August issue of Latitude
38.

Technical Difficulties

July 16 – Mill Valley

If you’ve tried calling our office in the
past few days, you may have been annoyed to find yourself lost
in space. We apologize for some problems with our phone system.
It’s particularly difficult as we are approaching deadline for
the August issue. Here are some alternative cell phone numbers
for our two Ad Guys, if you haven’t been able to reach them via
the office:

We apologize for any inconvenience and
hope to have these problems resolved soon.

YOTREPS

July 16 – The Pacific Ocean and Cyberspace

Who is out making passages in the Pacific
and what kind of weather are they having? The YOTREPS daily yacht
tracking page has moved to www.bitwrangler.com/psn.

Weather Updates

July 16 – Pacific
Ocean

San Francisco Bay Weather

Check out this guide to San Francisco Bay
Navigational Aids: http://sfports.wr.usgs.gov/sfports.html.

To see what the winds are like on the Bay
and just outside the Gate right now, check out http://sfports.wr.usgs.gov/wind.

The National Weather Service site for San
Francisco Bay is at www.wrh.noaa.gov/Monterey.

California Coast Weather

Looking for current as well as recent wind
and sea readings from 17 buoys and stations between Pt. Arena
and the Mexican border? Here’s the place – which has further
links to weather buoys and stations all over the U.S.: www.ndbc.noaa.gov/Maps/Southwest.shtml.

Pacific Winds and Pressure

The University of Hawaii Dept. of Meteorology
page posts a daily map of the NE Pacific Ocean barometric
pressure and winds.

Pacific Sea State

Check out the Pacific Ocean sea states
at: http://www.mpc.ncep.noaa.gov/RSSA/PacRegSSA.html.

For views of sea states anywhere in the world,
see http://www.oceanweather.com/data.