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By LEN BOSE
As we sail into September, I wanted to recap Long Point Race Week before it all fades away into the Summer of 2022.
I did get one of my predictions correct: It was a struggle to make it to and through the Saturday party. We had way too much fun on Friday night; one would think I would pace myself after all these years. I am never going into Avalon again after the party just to see how old I am now at the different bars. This year, I returned to where offshore sailing all started for me aboard the 1982 Choate 48 Amante with the Richley family. Buddy Richley was at the helm this weekend and had picture-perfect starts in all three races. On Friday’s race, sailing to Catalina, we noticed the wind was consistent across the course out of the southwest, the forecast was for 10 to 12 knots of breeze possibly reaching 14 knots as we approached the island. One of the four weather forecast models had an eddy, wind circling off the island, right at the finish line off of Long Point.
We sailed out to sea off the starting line and then tacked to port to head west up the coast. We hit the first shift and were sailing faster and higher than the boats that tacked to head up the coast before we did. Odds are favored to sail up the coast sooner rather than later, so we were fortunate for the time being. As we sailed up the coast and passed the Huntington Beach Pier, Buddy and I talked about heading back out to sea and leading the boats that had tacked earlier than us. We also noticed two of our three boats that headed out to sea, toward Catalina straight off the starting line. The boats that had tacked to go up the beach before us were starting to tack off the beach with Buddy Richley deciding to tack before we crossed them and head out to sea. The wind shifted more to the west and at this time we were looking golden heading straight for the finish line. About two-thirds of the way to the island we had already engraved our names into the pickle dishes. Buddy and I both know that 6 times out of 10 in this race you can run into a dead zone about three miles before you reach the island. We elected to sail west of the finish line and lost big. The boats that sailed straight to the island caught the southerly breeze and crushed us along with most of the fleet. Tough way to lose after having a huge lead.
On day two, we started further up the island then we normally do, rounded bird rock than headed back down to Long Point…without a doubt my favorite race of the year. Buddy crushed the start by ducking all the starboard boats on port and punching out from the fleet. After rounding bird rock, the wind slowly came from behind us and the spinnakers started appearing. The wind dissipated along the island with most of the fleet staying inside and closest to the island. Ten to 15 of the 40 boats entered, Amante included, and went outside hoping for more breeze. We were with all the top big boats who took that route and were already engraving our names on the pickle dish again. As we were working our way in from the outside back into Long Point, the breeze vanished. We had left most of the fleet that went in closest to the island, three miles behind us. Right then the breeze filled in from the west along the inside which brought in the whole fleet in one large hairball. I can’t imagine what was said on the race committee boat as the whole fleet approached in the same breath. Again, we sailed very well and coughed up hairballs at the finish.
On day three, during the run home from Long Point to Newport Pier, Buddy had another good start by staying out of the traffic in the light breeze and we were one of the first boats to tack over to port and head for home. Not anyone on the boat brought up the chance of winning the race, yet again it looked very good for us two-thirds of the way home. The wind then filled in from the west with reaching sails being traded for downwind spinnakers. Long story short, the younger lighter boats sailed away from us.
With this all being said, I was sunburnt, not at the top of my game and feeling my age. Two days later, I had noticed Amante had its best overall finish in the history of the event, finishing in 10th place out of 40 boats. After recognizing this I started feeling much better; I might even sail in this race again next year. Top Newport Beach finishers Molly Lynch and Alan Andrews aboard Doubletime finished in 2nd overall; Bryan Nickel aboard Blitz finished in 8th, Buddy Richley in 10th and Jim Baily finished in 13th aboard Destroyer.
Time to get serious with the Harbor 20s over the next three weeks as we will have our warm-up regattas before the grand finale of the season – our Fleet Championships.
Wish me luck!
Sea Ya.
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Len Bose is a yachting enthusiast, yacht broker and harbor columnist for Stu News Newport.
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