The J/80 World's were just completed and we are lucky enough to have this report about the regatta filed by SA reader Tripp Westbrook. A big thanks to Tripp, and Enjoy. - Ed.

A funny thing happens when you tell your friends you're competing in a sailing world championship, the first thing they say is, "Wow, that's really cool, where? France? Sweden?" For the most part they get a little deflated when you tell them on a lake in the middle of Texas.

But that's exactly where the J-80 Worlds were held this year, at Ft. Worth Boat Club on Eagle Mountain Lake.

Perception aside, this turned out to be an ideal location. FWBC is an established and highly regarded yacht club that boasts of being the primary sponsor of several America's Cup campaigns and Eagle Mountain Lake makes for a very appealing backdrop. It may not have the cache of many of its coastal brethren, but history and passion run deep at this club.

The biggest question on everyone's mind though was "will there be wind?"

Saturday and Sunday were calm and seemed to give an uneasy premonition of things to come. In fact, one of the Swedish teams was overheard lamenting that they came all this way for this. In fact, all 49 teams (including 4 Swede, 1 Denmark and 1 French) were beginning to fear the worst. But as Monday (practice day) rolled around so too came the fronts. First from the South and then the North bringing with them winds in the mid to high teens (with higher gusts) for the entire week.

Sunny and breezy: It's doesn't get much better.

The racing was terrific right from the start. The lake, while breezy, is known for having lots of wind lanes and shifty conditions. To win here you have to not only find the lanes and hold them, but you have to hit your shifts or else you have a hard time making it back across the course.

From the get go, it was obvious that Jay Lutz and team were on their game taking two firsts and a sixth on the day one. Only Young/Spurlin and crew on Boomerang posted a numerically better day with a 3-2-1 but that was not to hold up for very long.

The rest of the week quickly became a battle for second between John Kolius, Kerry Klingler on USA 352, Christer Faith-El on SwedeShipping and Young/Spurlin on Boomerang. It ultimately came down to the last race on the last day where only four points separated second through fifth place. Kerry Klingler dominated this final race but unfortunately was hit with a "Z" flag violation at the start and thus a 20% penalty. This left the top five spots to be sorted out in the order of Lutz, Kolius, Faith-El, Klingler and Young/Spurlin.

On a side note, the race committee did a very cool thing with the race results that I hadn't seen before. At each weather mark rounding, every boat's position was uploaded to the web for viewing by anyone, anywhere. Perfect for family and friends who couldn't be there. It was also a nice, high-tech touch that had the side effect of creating a "string" chart of each of your races. You could then do a post-mortem of your race and see where you rallied and where you bombed. Way cool.


Ft. Worth Boat Club
on Eagle Mountain Lake

Personally, I had a great time racing with Scott Young, Scott Spurlin (owner) and John Morran on Boomerang. This class is made up of so many really great people and almost no pricks to spoil the fun (ok, maybe one or two, but that's it). There were also more than a couple of Anarchists running around including 80Sailor, Steve Hammerman, and a regular name-switching poster (don't worry, I won't out you Grey). I also want to commend Martha and Craig White (Warrior) on an excellent job pulling together a world-class event.

It's a fun boat, a fun class and events like these are why we keep coming back. And while next year I may have a better answer when my friends ask, "Where are they being held?" (Sweden), it's got big shoes to fill to be a better regatta.