While not California club racing conditions, I race sailboats on the Detroit River from May to September.
Sailing became a pastime a short time after my wife and I stood atop an apartment building adjacent to the Windsor Yacht Club and watched the sleek white sailboats drifting into the harbor. The following spring we began sailing our own white C&C 24, spending every waking hour on the water.
A few years after that, a neighbor suggested I call one of her friend’s sons, because he was looking for crew to race on his Mirage 24 on Wednesday nights. Without hesitation, I called and agreed to be a regular. Several years later, when the boat was traded in for a larger one, a Mirage 27.5, I continued to faithfully show up on Wednesday nights. But the skipper was an elementary school principal, and his duties were eating up much of his time. So, after 16 years he finally decided to take a year off from racing and I was left to find another boat.
My first inclination was to call Harry (all the names here are pseudonyms), the skipper who always seemed to beat us on another Mirage 27.5. But Harry had developed the reputation of being a Captain Bligh and I wondered about this; I wasn’t sure I wanted to tolerate the verbal abuse that he handed out in the midst of the chaos that sometimes accompanies a sailboat race. Still I called.
Harry welcomed me, but only temporarily. As he explained it, he usually had a full crew; but not always and not that particular Wednesday. On board, it was explained that Army was the foredeck man because, as Harry put it, "Army will do anything up there!" While Army flew the spinnaker, Charlie ran the main and I was assigned the grunt job of hauling in and releasing the genoas during the tacks. I’m still sailing with Harry 13 years later.
Interview of the Crew
Right now, I’m enjoying some clam chowder at my kitchen island and listening to a CD of Army, my sailboat racing buddy, interviewing his Wednesday night crew members. In the background are the noises of a sailboat race.
The crew is a mixed bunch: I’m the tall, grey-haired and slightly balding retired high school geography teacher and saxophone player; Harry, the skipper, is lean and bearded, of average height, in his early fifties, and retired from Ontario Hydro; Army, in his late forties, is retired from working on air for CBC radio; and Charlie, grey-haired and suave and approaching age fifty, still sells suits at Freeds and talks about the famous people he meets.
I remember that Army had shown up on a particularly blustery night at one of our July races. There were storm warnings, and I could see the dark clouds and hear the rumbling of thunder in the distance. The forecast indicated that the storms would stay to the south but as a precaution, the race start was delayed for an hour. This didn’t surprise me because one thing I’d discovered about sailboat racers over the years was that they didn’t willingly tempt fate. But there was Army with his mobile recording system.
Before the race he interviewed the crew and during it he kept the mike live. The final product, given to each crew member as a gift, featured interviews mixed in with live action from the race. You are witness.
Witnessing the Start
“Let’s see what’s happening with the start …. Let’s go for the line. We’re going to jibe and go for the pin, okay?” The live action words of the skipper, Harry, are followed by the squeaking and clanking sound of the winches.
Then Army begins an interview with Harry, who explains that he sails “because it relieves stress, and it is a good sport to develop friendships, lifelong friendships and good comradeship.”
“Now you’re not going very fast, when you’re racing,” says Army. “It’s not like a car racer, something like that; you’re only going, like about four, five, six knots, right?”
Harry first explains that six knots is good for 27- foot boats and that, with the spinnaker up on runs or reaches, you can get speeds of seven or eight knots. Then he qualifies it by adding that on a night like this, which is very gusty with the wind from behind, the control gets marginal as the boat wants to do some rolling from side to side.
“And, what is it that turns your crank about that?” asks Army.
Harry gets technical, using the term “repeatability” and explaining that if you’ve got a south wind you know where to put the boat for the start. He adds that it’s a matter of timing – you want a timed start, where you’re going at full speed toward the line without being over a second early; or the race committee will call you over, and you have to round the end, and by that time most of your competition will be a couple of hundred yards down the race course.
As a transition into the next interview, Army focuses on Harry preparing for a tacking maneuver. “Okay, ready about? Going back down …. I’ll break.”
Witnessing a Starboard Tack
Army then uses the skipper’s instructions for going behind a boat crossing on a starboard tack to transition into the interview with another crew member, Charlie, the least experienced member of the crew.
“We want to go below Hal (the skipper of a competing boat). Ease the main! Ease the main. We’ve got to watch for starboard tacks, eh guys?”
Then Charlie explains that sailing is something that Harry invited him out to try one night just to see how he’d like the sport. He emphasizes that it was different than what he anticipated. “I think when you’re involved in racing there’s a lot to do, whereas in cruising, you just set the sails and enjoy the sailing aspect of it. It’s very competitive, it’s a lot of fun, and there’s a lot to learn.”
Witnessing the Finish
With the interviews completed, and the race finishing I hear the sound of the fog horn from the deck of the race committee boat. As I recall, we had a last place start but over the five miles of the course managed to claw our way back to a third place finish.
“Thank you!” I hear myself exclaim in a loud voice as I acknowledge the race committee’s signal that the boat is over the finish line.
I recall that everyone on board smiled and remember Harry’s look of relief that triggered some giggling.
Army then broke out his hearty laugh, as Charlie exclaimed, “Harry!” and handed him a Labatt’s Blue, something that was never spelled out in the feature. “There you go. There you go.”
“It didn’t look good there for a while,” comments Harry on tape.
“Oh – no!” responds Army to end the feature.
Sipping soup while there's ice on the river isn't quite as exciting as racing in summer, but hearing the team's voices and the sounds of the race brought back the thrill of being there.
James Gibson - James Gibson is a retired teacher and small business owner. He is a published writer and has a wide spectrum of interests.
Join the Conversation