Greeting from the Prez – August 2004

First, I’d like to welcome John McDonough to the fleet. John bought Jeff Dinsmore’s old boat 1194 Verbier. He hopes to get out on the race course very soon.

Before recapping Race Week, there is one item I’d like you to add to your calendar. The Labor Day Series this year is September 4th and 5th. Last year the Rhodes really didn’t participate because of

Nationals, but it would be nice to have this be a real event this year. Also, the Hallawell’s will be hosting a party Sunday evening September 5th. So mark you calendars and plan on attending.

The MRA Series #2 finished up this past weekend. Results are included in this newsletter. As to Race Week, it’s hard to know where to start – what a race week! It seemed as grueling as the Tour de France or the Boston Marathon. 10 races over 4 days.

First, a thank you goes out to Dennis Esposito & the CYC race committee who ran all these races and did a superb job. I hope you’ll all pass along that sentiment if you have the chance. Second, a thank you to Tom & Judy Despres, assisted by John Casler, who organized the party at the Corinthian on Thursday night. It was a beautiful venue and evening. We also learned that we’re not very good at estimating burger consumption per person!

As to the sailing – congratulations and thank you to everyone who got out there. There were faces that I hadn’t seen all year, and it was great to see them on the race course. (John T & Henry P, where have you been?). I can’t in a short email begin to describe all the twists and turns of the racing, but I’ll try to recap things a bit for those who weren’t there. Quite frankly, I don’t remember Thursday anymore, except that Renee & Bill Heffernan got off to a great start with finishes that includes a 1st and 2nd. Other than Bill, the results were very mixed with nobody showing consistently strong results. That trend continued for most of the regatta, with a variety of boats way up and way down, finding it challenging to put together a string of consistent finishes. On Friday, Wiley Crockett made his move, jumping up to 3rd in the standings. Some other boats that displayed flashes of brilliance included Steve Braese sailing with his son, Ken Cormier/Sandy Warrick, and the always fast Carpenter/Mansfield duo. The big hurdle I think in the whole regatta was not to have an exploding race (e.g. OCS, etc.). Confusion in Race 6 at the leeward mark, and numerous OCSs particularly in Race 8, knocked several boats down considerably, including those with otherwise blinding speed. In the end, consistency brought good results, as evidenced by Jim Taylor and by Chris Hutchinson. Of course, in the end the biggest congratulations go to Christina & Kim Pandapas who won the regatta through consistency and smart racing, working back from a tough first day and systematically gaining points on the field. But with all that, it was amazing how fluid the results were even up to the last race.