'Round Whidbey 2005

The Story

The Results | The Story | The Photos

A class act from start to finish!

It is almost 3 weeks now since the race and I still live parts of it in my mind during quiet times. Each year it seems to be that way. The event is not easy to win and has been won by those that truly sail their boats the best with the most loyal crews. At 65 nautical miles you have to consider at least 3 tide changes and the wind that comes then goes; you start in the daylight and finish in the dark, or maybe the daylight; down Admiralty inlet you cross the ferry route to Port Townsend and navigate with the commercial traffic in and out of the separation zones. Oh yes, weather happens too.

Put on by the Whidbey Island Naval Sailing Association (WINSA) and the Oak Harbor Yacht Club, and sponsored by Sail Northwest and Northwest Marine Productions (yes, the people that do Whidbey Island Race Week), the race would seem little known in Puget Sound. It draws only about 15 boats each year, advertised mostly by word of mouth. This year the schedule was in 48 North and it did bring some new faces to the skippers meeting. Most boats are loyal returns. The race is inexpensive at $40 dollars per boat or $35 if you belong to any national sailing organization or are affiliated in anyway with the organizers of it and has never been a fund-raiser for anyone involved. It has been the goal of the organizers to give back every dollar taken in and we mostly succeed. It is a gift to the sailing community put on by volunteers since 1981 when it originated at the Oak Harbor Yacht Club.

This year as in the past the fun began with a BBQ near the dock at Cornet Bay, Deception Pass State Park. Officially dinner was to be served at 5:00 PM with the skippers meeting to follow at 7:00 PM. Truthfully though, if you were present at 2:00 PM and willing to help unload the grills, coolers and food from the truck it was Party ON. Members from all the organizations involved were present and helped with the line handling of arriving boats. If you were going to arrive late because of commitments and it was known then, part of the party was kept for your participation; no one was left out. The stories from last year and bold talk for this year could be heard around the tables when their mouths weren't busy eating the 1/3 lb ground sirloin burgers, foot-long polish sausages, alder smoked teriyaki chicken and salads as well as Veggie burgers. There were plans to tie buckets to the rudder of the Catalina 22 that has twice won the race. You know all the friendly stuff that you could do to help the competition.

At the skippers meeting the rules of the race were handed out. They explain clearance for ferries, stay clear zones for US Navy traffic, right of way for commercial traffic, and the requirements to monitor VHF channels for commercial traffic, the committee boat and channel 16 as always. During the reading of the PHRF handicaps comments from the crowd alluded to recent wax jobs on some of the boats as perhaps modifiers to their numbers. Or the smoothing of airflow over a foil by way of painting a mast could make a difference. The race committee stood their ground and the numbers stuck.

At 9:00 AM on Saturday, just west of Deception Pass, the start horn sounded, the flag fell and the race was on. In light air the fleet of 13 boats split into two groups, those that chose to go close to the beach and those that went off shore toward Smith Island. In breezes that came and went the beach boats seemed to do the best. In a 65 mile race each portion that leads to the next nav turn point feels like a race unto itself and the race to Partridge Point was won by the beach boats.

The next phase is the trip down Admiralty Inlet and we started it just at the turn of the tide to incoming water and a wind shift to the west. With the wind shift crews scrambled to get their spinnakers flying and as usual the fleet took off in everyone's direction. Unusual for this year, the entire fleet was within site of each other for the total distance to the south tip of Whidbey Island, Possession Point. The lead changed hands several times as tide rips, current, counter currents and wind affected the progress of each boat. Admiralty Inlet is a navigators nightmare and sometimes the best thing that ever happened to a guy with a lucky guess. By 6:00 PM all boats regardless of direction taken were closing on Possession Point.

After rounding Possession Point together the trial began in a dead calm; for the next 12 hours most of us sailed back and forth over the same 400 yards of water. At one point with the crew on my boat on the leeward side and my sails bagged out we achieved a proper shape for lift, we sailed all the way to 3rd place only to be spun by the outgoing tide to the back of the fleet. Entertained by gray whales that surfaced around us, the birds that do sing at night, dogs that bark, the sound of cars moving on nearby roads while we marveled at the reflection in the flat calm water, quitting seemed the easy way to end it. Many would make that decision; some at two hours, a few at six hours, a couple at ten and some at 12 hours.

Ed Kennedy on Sling Shot (a J-30) had made the decision to hug the beach on the Whidbey Island side early and at first that didn't seem to work as the rest of us sailed past him. For the next eight hours sailing so close to the beach it looked like his crew could walk ashore if they wanted to; he used every puff of breeze from the trees to inch his way north and take the lead. Ted Clifton on Lissa (a Crown 34,) who had led most of the race, found wind pulling away from the fleet just before dawn to give chase. Dean Sevon and Mistral (a Cal 39) were the next to break out in a line of wind that I couldn't sail to. A US 25 captained by Tom Black had escaped the fleet during the night by sailing toward Mukilteo and was on a converging course with Mistral as the wind filled in north of Gedney Island. With 10 plus knots of wind from the South East the large boats popped their chutes and the US 25 was broad reaching and sailing wing on wing to keep up. I could see the action because after 12 and a half hours while still in flat calm conditions I dropped my sails and started the engine. Three miles north I caught sight of the lead boats and could see that the US 25 would at times close on the larger boats. When I came into sight of the finish line I could see the order in which the boats would cross the line but until I saw the official results I couldn't tell if the small boat would be a giant killer. In the end it would be: