Local Knowledge

Lake Michigan Team Wins the Richardson Cup

Racine, Wisconsin - On October 6th and 7th, 2004 Racine Yacht Club hosted the 65th running of the Richardson Cup Match Racing Regatta. Teams representing all 5 Great Lakes and Lake St, Claire were attending the event to try to win the Richardson Cup away from Lake Michigan who won the Cup back last year for the first time in over 60 years. The Richardson Cup is an ISAF grade 4 match-racing regatta determining the Great Lakes Match Racing Champion. The first Richardson Cup was held in 1912.

The first day of racing was right outside the Racine Harbor on Lake Michigan. The wind started out fairly decent at about 12-16 knots. The first flight would be delayed due to a technical difficulty on the mark set boat. Once the races started they were able to go through the first round robin without a hitch. The Race Committee did a good job rotating the course as the breeze shifted back and forth and the sea breeze and the shore breeze fought to see which would prevail. The shore breeze seemed to look stronger all day but the shore puffs would get the better angles to win out. As the day went on the breeze would gradually die down to about 6-8 knots by the end of the day.

After the first round robin things would be pretty close as Justin Hood's Lake Michigan team would have a one point lead over Chris Van Tol's team from Detroit, MI and Kevin Doyle's team from Buffalo, NY. Rounding out the fleet would be Tyson Connolly from Sarnia, Canada, Lars Hansen from Minnesota and Kevin Thomas from Ohio.

The Race Committee would get the first flight of round robin two off in light winds to round out the day. The teams would make it in for a much appreciated cook out at the club as well as a debrief to talk about what happened during the racing and give everyone an opportunity to learn and improve for the final day of racing. There were plenty of questions asked to the Chief Umpire and everyone would get a better perspective of what the umpires were looking at when making their calls.

Day two of the Richardson Cup would start off with light shifty air and things would only get worse. The wind would only reach 5.5 knots for a brief moment and with the Northern swell that developed over night the Race Committee would not be able to get any racing in. One full round robin was complete so the officials would need to go off of that in order to score the regatta.

Justin Hood's team representing Spring Lake Yacht Club in Michigan and LMSRF the governing body for Lake Michigan would win the Richardson Cup. YRUGL President Scott Spaeth was in attendance to address the crowd and award the trophy. Justin Hood's team included Tac Boston, Ed Furry, Mike Hill and Gary Waldron would enjoy the first sip of Stinger's, the traditional Richardson Cup celebratory drink to be had out of the Tiffany crafted canoe shaped cup. Next year's Richardson Cup will be hosted by Bayview Yacht Club on Lake St. Claire near Detroit, MI.

A special thanks goes out to Regatta Chairman, Mark Rode, the Rear Commodore of Racine Yacht Club, the Race Committee lead by Dick Sweers from Chicago, Lead Umpires Cliff Black from Chicago, John Lee from Miami and Bill Thorpe from Detroit. Other umpires included Ted Jones of Chicago, Gary Hendrickson of Racine and Dean Cady of Milwaukee. And a final thank you goes out to Fred Stritt for loaning out his time and sailboat to be used as the change boat.

10/22/04