Behind the Scenes, February 2019

We are fans of the wall calendar, and the start of each month welcomes new imagery from our J/Boats, Onne van der Wal, and Sharon Green calendars. Here Sharon shares the behind-the-scenes story from February of her 2019 Ultimate Sailing Calendar.

San Francisco Bay is one of the world’s cradles of sailing, surrounded by rugged shoreline and iconic backdrops. Add in the Bay’s big breeze, chop, and tides, and the venue becomes both exhilarating for sailing and shooting.

Offering one of my annual highlights is the Bay’s signature event, the St. Francis Yacht Club’s Rolex Big Boat Series, and the Pac 52 is, in turn, its signature class.

Born of a desire to return a concept back to its roots in California, the Pac 52 Class pursued the premise of promoting dual-purpose inshore/offshore boats, launching a rule which makes for craft similar to the inshore TP 52 but features increased stability and sail area.

While seen as the ultimate in grand-prix inshore racing, the TP 52 circuit in the Mediterranean came from a new class launched in California near the turn of the century as the TransPac52. The advent of the Pac 52 marks a revival of elite custom boat competition to the west coast, and for last year’s Rolex Big Boat Series, drew boats from opposite ends of the earth.

The Bay corrals the biggest of the big boats like the Pac 52s, compressing the competition to deliver electric action, while occasionally allowing them to stretch their legs beyond the confines of the Golden Gate Bridge. This is all what I live for, framing the energy on the water amid the Bay’s dynamic backdrop.

The February images capture the enormity of the bridge, offering scale to the clash below, while the backdrop of the Sausalito hills provide rural texture to what is the cultural, commercial, and financial center of Northern California.

Our Ultimate Sailing Team will be at the 55th running of the Rolex Big Boat Series to again capture all the action on September 11-15, 2019.