2022 505 East Coast Champs
505 American Section Webmaster
Though tenuously an “East Coast” venue, Kingston YC hosted the event we’ve all been waiting for, even if a bunch of East Coasters couldn’t make it thanks to just having done the Worlds, or other lame excuses like Tom “COVID” Kivney had. Cross-border travel is now a snap, thanks to Ali letting us all know about the ArriveCAN app and the US’s nonchalant land-based border protocols. It was great to have the Canadian and US fleets back together again.
Kingston laid out the welcome mat for 3.75 US teams and 12.25 Canadian teams. Jeff and Flo Boyd hosting a fun evening at their house that’s almost on the clubhouse grounds on Friday, and a post-racing spread at the club on Saturday. PRO Bill Visser and his team walked through the vagaries of weak troughs in the lower Midwest and widespread thunderstorms to serve up 7 great races over the 3 days.
Friday was the postcard Kingston day – the thermal clouds built during the skippers meeting and by the time we hit the course it was solid upwind trapping with how to sail the runs in the “good question” column. Sitting was the right answer. Ethan Bixby and Chris Brady held off a bunch of challenges from various teams to start their recurring theme to open with a win over Keith Longson and me, followed by Macy Nelson/Nate Barton. The breeze built through the second and third races, with minor variations on the first race’s finish order. Robert Bartlewski and Andrew Gesing and legends Boyd and ten Hove were constantly in the mix, with Lovshin family members inevitably sniffing the front from time to time (they were 1/6th of the fleet, after all). By race three it was “east coast nuking” with Paul Place and Devlin Lovshin hitting speed records on the beats. Pink boats are fast. Though they occasionally let others cross them and lead them around marks, Ethan and Chris managed to always find the front at the critical time.
The thermal machine made a noble fight against a consistently described “weak lower-level trough” between Michigan and Ohio, but by shortly after noon we had enough breeze to leave the dock and get a start off at 130. Keith and I had a cracker of a start and first beat to lead while Ethan and Chris were uncharacteristically deep and couldn’t find the passing lanes. Down the last run it was “just sail straight to the finish” until it wasn’t. Ethan and Chris, followed by the just-arrived Marek and Alex, found the golden ticket puff to begin the run. Ethan and Chris went from 6th to 1st, with Marek and Alex wedging between me and Keith and the pack that had been 2nd – 5th to grab the 3rd. After a brief wait, it was evident that the trough would prevail and we went to the bar. At this point, the closest battles were between Macy/Nate and me and Keith for 2nd overall, and Robert/Andrew and Jeff/Martin for 4th.
Ali showed up Saturday afternoon to regale us with tales from Ireland, and then led a very productive discussion on Sunday morning while we waited for thunderstorms to pass. Once the storms were gone, it was back on the water in more “east coast nuking” (aka 18) to do as much sailing as possible before a 1430 last start deadline. Needing to beat Macy and Nate just once to secure second, Keith and I again narrowly snatched defeat from the jaws of victory to let Ethan and Chris continue their picket fence, with Macy/Nate in 3rd and Robert/Andrew in 4th. Ethan and Chris left early to pack up, leaving the rest of the nearly boats to fight out being the other boat to win a race. At the top mark, Jeff/Martin, Robert/Andrew and Keith and I were in a pile. With a good set and good pace, we slipped away to finally win one, with Robert/Andrew 2nd and Jeff/Martin 3rd.
A big percentage of the fleet was able to make their boats go through the water quickly enough, but Ethan and Chris just never slowed down and were able to be directionally correct enough to do what they did to the rest of us.
One very cool note on the awards – Jeff donated a pile of his lifetime stash of CORK award plaques to be repurposed with new event/placement labels and creating totally unique and awesome awards, but of course in taking 5th he didn’t quite get rid of all of them.