Etchells Survive Madness in Miami

The second regatta in the 4-event Etchells Biscayne Bay Series, the Sidney Doren Memorial Regatta, was held January 7-8 in Miami, FL. The weekend racing was dominated by the major cold front that was making headlines throughout the Eastern USA.

Saturday’s racing began with warm temperatures in the mid 70’s and SSW winds around 15 knots. However, the balmy weather was soon to change when the cold front came roaring through south Florida around 1:30 in the afternoon.

Commanders Weather service called race PRO Stuart Childerly about 1 pm and advised him to get the boats off the water ASAP as they were expecting 30+ knot winds with higher gusts and imbedded thunderstorms in the rapidly approaching cold front.

With one full race completed and a second race shortened after two legs, the fleet cleared the course before the 30+ knot winds and rain came roaring through about 2 pm.

While Sunday began with clear skies, the wind speed was about 20 knots at sunrise, increasing by 9 am the winds to 25+ knots out on the bay with gusts in the low 30’s.

PRO Childerly wisely called off racing at 9:30am and the beer kegs were tapped early. Later in the afternoon, the winds moderated to around 20 knots, but by then it was too late to get any further racing in.

Final Results (Top 10 of 43 (2 races)
1. Raging Rooster, Peter Duncan / Jud Smith / Andrew Palfry , USA – 3 -4 ; 7
2. Swedish Blue, Ante Razmilovic / Brian Hammersley / Andrew Mills , GBR – 6 -2 ; 8
3. Arethusa, Phil Lotz / Luke Lawrence / Eric Lawrence / Alan Kelly , USA – 1 -8 ; 9
4. Provezza, Peter Holmberg / Tony Rey / Simon Fry , USA – 12 -1 ; 13
5. Tiburon, Dirk Kneulman / Mark Watson / Andreas Josenhans / Chris Larson , USA – 8 -5 ; 13
6. Terrapin, Steve Benjamin / David Hughes / Ian Liberty / Michael Menninger , USA – 13 -3 ; 16
7. USA 1185, Robert Allardice / Tomas Hornos / Emily Roberts / Will Pelleteri , USA – 4 -13 ; 17
8. GBR 1424, Barry Parkin / Noel Drennan / Adrian Owles , USA – 9 -9 ; 18
9. Freedom, Craig Mense / Fred Strannahan / John Hartford / Nicole Popp , USA – 2 -20 ; 22
10. Clean Execution, Michael Gavin / Bill Abbott / Wes Beamus , USA – 20 -7 ; 27

Event details – Final results

 
2017 Etchells Biscayne Bay Series
Louis Piana Cup Regatta – December 10-11, 2016
Sidney Doren Memorial Regatta – January 7-8, 2017
Florida State Championship – February 4-5, 2017
Mid-Winter’s East Regatta – February 24-26, 2017

Series Details: To qualify for the overall 2017 Etchells Biscayne Bay Series prizes, boats must include their place in the Mid -Winters Regatta and any two of the other three individual regattas (Piana Cup, Sidney Doren Memorial, Florida State Championship). Place scores from each individual regatta of the series will be used with the Low Point Scoring System (1st Place = 1 point, 2nd Place = 2 points, 3rd Place = 3 points, etc.). The boat with the lowest score will be declared the overall winner of the 201 7 Biscayne Bay Series.

Source: Ken Batzer