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Hardway
Race report
- Hardway race
Set up - The
Hardway race is a local to Santa Barbara ocean race that starts in Santa
Barbara and ends in Ventura. The Classic Hardway route is 67 miles, Santa
Cruz Isle to port. The Coastal, or Easy Way route is 43 miles inside the
channel. For some reason the multi hulls did an ~50 mile trip around Anacapa
Isl. to port - guess they didn't want any upwind work.
The race is
getting less and less popular - mostly because everyone is getting smarter.
I have only finished before midnight once and that was on Taxi Dancer.
The usual form is very light upwind at the start, building and clocking
right as the day goes on. Then very windy downwind on the backside of
the island. Then the wind shutting off about dark and a drift-athon till
about 9:00 am the next morning when you finally finish in a light land
breeze.
This
year was all of that. Only 4 boats did the classic and the Bene quit.
Leaving three finishers. The Moore 24 won and beat XS (the old Sparky,
(Mull 30)) boat for boat - ouch (Moore 24 elapsed time 20:22, XS elapsed
time 21:40)
In the multihulls
I don't know who corrected out but Afterburner finished first in about
6 hours.
We did the
coastal route with about 8 boats. The start was scheduled for 10 and the
RC delayed 15 minutes for breeze. They set up for the southerly and when
a bit of a right puff came in they sent us off with out resetting the
line. We were at the pin about 10 seconds late going about 2 kts - the
morning's entertainment was provided by an Olson 30 reaching down the
line barging in and suggesting that we should let him because of, 1. "Proper
course", and 2. The RC was an "obstruction". When it becomes
apparent we aren't budging he bears way off - could have been scary, but
at 1.5 kts all is ok.
The only tactical
part of the race is the first 12 miles to the NOAA mid channel bouy. Some
guys go out looking for the first pressure, others go up the coast looking
for the right shift. This year it was a bit of both - the winners went
up the coast for a bit then picked the right time to go out. The Farr
40 rounded first about 2:00 PM then jibe set to go back to Santa Barbara.
They had said if they weren't around by 2 or if the wind wasn't up they
were going home. Next around was the big 'ol Choate 48, The Olson and
the Catalina 23.5 (M24 look alike) were looking good outside and we were
inside waiting for the right to come in. (never did).
The wind builds
as we get to the mark , 6 kts, then 8, then 9, and as we round, it jumps
to 13. The next two legs are a parade, 18 mile spinnaker reach in a building
breeze (saw 18 briefly) to platform Grace. We get lifted at the end and
miss it by a quarter mile, then an 11 mile reach in dying breeze to Ventura
harbor. We get put away about 7 and go have a massive dinner of sushi
& beer.
The Olson 30
corrects first, the Catalina 23 four minutes back, the Choate 48 is next
- 10 minutes after that, then us - 67 sec after the Choate, and 1 sec
ahead of the J35. The Trip was doing ok but fucked up the 1 jibe of the
day at the platform and fucked their pretty new aso on a long pole, took
em forever to get over that.
All and all
a nice day on the water - and no bobbing around in no wind on the backside
of the island all night either.
Pete Mohler
5/25/05
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