Martin, Lowry win 505 North Americans

Thirty boats from 12 states and 2 countries, including many of the world’s top 505 teams, came for the 2021 505 North American Championship on September 30 to October 3 in Newport, RI. While missing the Canadian contingent due to travel restriction, they encouraged the running of the event as planned and named.

With 2020 cancelled due to the pandemic, current World Champions Mike Martin and Adam Lowry hoisted the trophy yet again, besting Mike Holt/Carl Smit by 11 points, with Nic Baird and Eric Anderson 1 point further in arrears. AJ Conrads, sailing with Sol Marini, finished as top female helm.

Through 12 races over 4 days, Newport showed off its variety of conditions, first with a building northwesterly, full of puffs and shifts for four races. Boatspeed always helps, but managing the left side advantage upwind and finding puff lanes downwind were critical. Martin/Lowry led after 4 with 9, followed by Smit/Holt (11), and Baird/Anderson (13).

The second day was a lighter affair, with crews off the wire downwind for the first time. Despite one mile beats, the top marks were swarms of boats. Luckily 505 sailors all seemed to have watched enough Sesame Street as children and are able to work these things through.

PRO Sue Reilly and her team dealt with two 180* wind shifts in getting three off, with the last race coming alive down the first run with the fleet’s first taste of outside at Newport in fresh conditions. The top two boats both scored their throwout races this day, proving the challenge, but the overall picture remained fairly steady.

If that was the appetizer, day three was the entree with Newport serving up a classic high-teens southwesterly seasoned with an enormous groundswell thanks to an offshore storm. Holt and Smit grabbed the day by the throat with a 2-1-1 to Martin/Lowry’s 1-4-2 and move within two points for the overall.

So it was to be decided on the final day, and despite the somewhat lighter forecast, Sail Newport Regatta Director Matt Duggan chose to send the fleet outside on time to complete the last two races of the 12 race series. Once the fleet had hit the racing area, it was clear that Newport would over-deliver once again with nearly the same wind direction as the prior day, just with less punch.

In the first race, Baird/Anderson stretched an early lead over the first half of the race, only to have Martin/Lowry come screaming out of the right on the second beat to take the lead and ultimately the race win. With Holt/Smit crossing 4th, Martin/Lowry had one hand on the trophy. Despite a frenzied search for a hole on the start line in the last race, Martin/Lowry once again found their way to the front row and sealed the event with a final race win.

With 2021 in the books, the class now looks forward to the 2022 Midwinters (February 12-13) and North Americans (February 16-20) in Clearwater FL.

Event information – Race details – Results

Final Results (Top 10 of 30; 12 races, 1 discard)

Source: David Kirkpatrick