Let me say that this has be a long few months and I appreciate every skipper that came out and played. And a huge thanks to Mike Krantz and the guys at LAYLINE for stepping up and providing the prize. The next time you see Mike be sure to tell him thanks. It was fun in its own special kind of boring way. But it could never serve as a substitute for doing the real thing.

Now that it is over and Erectile Dysfunction is back on its cradle, what the Hell am I going to do for content. Hmmm...I guess I'll have to resort back to some of my perfectly pointless commentary.

Till then, don't forget the Lake Lanier Sailing Club Firecracker Cup is an open event and is set for this Saturday- The Fourth of July! At only $15.00 to race, how can you pass that up. Go to the LLSC website for more details!

Kirk Out!

Now, who is going to be next? There are five weeks left where race management is needed. It shouldn't be a surprise that four of them are the last four weeks. Come on skippers, having to twist arms and relying on the same usual suspects gets old. Several have not came forward to do their part. The success of AISC really is a community effort, please do your part and contribute to the race management of the club.

Kirk Out!

And, the Virtual Volvo Ocean Race is over. And, for the Sail Lanier Challenge Group it has been a long hard battle. We now know who the top cats are in that group. Congratulations go out to our top finisher Chip Kruse driving Ischkabibbel. He ended up with 56 total points and chances. In second place is Scott McAllister sailing Breaking More Wind racking up a total of 49 points. And in third place is Chris sailing Pain Killer. And if I could remember his last name (it's too early) I'd mention it. At any rate, he racked up 44 points. Congrats to everyone and we'll be having the big drawing in just a few days. Good luck to all of you. Till then check out the Final Standings complete with the declaration of lottery Drawing Numbers.

Kirk Out!

For those participating in the Sail Lanier Challenge, we are only days away from finding out who wins the $100.00 gift certificate from or sponsor Layline. Here is how it is going to work.

To begin with, we must remember that, Sail Lanier and Layline personnel excluded, everyone will have a chance to win. However, the better you have performed over the past seven legs the better your chances. A first place in each leg is worth ten chances, a second is worth nine, and so on until each skipper collects their consolation chance of one. Click here if you are interested in seeing how things stack up going into the last race.

Once all the boats have finished, I will calculate the total number of chances for each skipper and the fleet as a whole. Then we will look at each chance as a lottery number. If the top winning skipper has say 55 chances, that skipper will possess lottery numbers 1 through 55. If the second place skipper ends up with 45 chances, he or she will have lottery numbers 56 through 100, and so on and so on.

After figuring out the lottery numbers for each skipper, then it all becomes a matter of chance. Then comes the picking of the number. At first I thought of doing tickets and drawing a number, but that is messing and to be honest, kinds of sucks. So, in this technological age, we will keep it simple and clean and turn to the folks at Random.Org. Go figure, who would have thought that there would be a website designed to do nothing more than generate random numbers.

After plugging in all the parameters, we will hit the enter button and BLAMB! Determine the winner. So, stay tuned.

Entry Fee: ONLY $15.00 for Non-Members
Meals: Only $15.00 per head
Registration: From 0900 to 0930
Skipper's Meeting: 0930
First Start: 1100
Fleets to be determined at Skipper's Meeting

But what a fabulous weekend, it was Georgia hot and breezy. You really couldn't have asked for more. However, asking for less is another thing. Like less stinkpots and lake lice, that would have been perfect. But let's not start the season off by being too greedy.

And as promised, we now have some more pictures to share from this year's Reggae Regatta. Joe Seymour, educator, photographer, and retired squid (I knew there was something I liked about that guy) was out on the water with his camera and captured some great moments from the event. He has shared his personal favorites from the event on his website. He will also be sharing a few DVDs with a more complete set of photos. The idea being that if you get your hands on the disk, make yourself a copy, make a couple more, and keep them moving about the fleet. Till then, enjoy Joe's good work at his website. Thanks Joe!

Well, so much for that. The first half of the 2009 Wednesday Night Racing is done. What appeared to be developing as a miserable drifter or abandonment, actually turned into a nice night of light air racing; a preview of weeks to come. That said, the results from Race #10 have been posted. The first-half overalls will be presented at the Awards Party; next Wednesday night, 7 PM at Tabby's Irish Pub located at Tannery Row in Buford. See you all there.

And for all you Sail Lanier Challenge skippers, mark your calendar. The start to the last and final leg of this virtual ocean race is set for June 25th. It is a short leg, only 370 miles, but it's a damn near straight shot. Personally, I'm hoping for a hot fast reach. It's also your last shot to increase your odds of winning that $100.00 Layline gift certificate, so give it your all. Check your current standing here.

Kirk Out!

Also, as an FYI, you may remember a few weeks past that a Mr. J. Seymour took and shared a ton of Wednesday pictures. Well as it turns out, he was out and about on Saturday of the Reggae and took a ton of happy. He will post some to his website and place even more on a few disks that will be available for sharing. We will keep you posted.

Kirk Out!

In other news the Sail Lanier Challenges continues to move forward, but with these last few really short, but challenging legs, I have gotten behind in my Congratulations.

Taking top honors, and moving up the board, in In leg eight was Why Knotticle, followed by Ischkabibbel, and Pain Killer.

And while some boats are still finishing leg nine, we can announce the top three boats there as well. Getting the horn in Stockholm was Direwolf. The first loser was again Ischkabibbel with Pain Killer slipping in for a third.

Overall, with consistent finishes in the top 5 spots and atop the Sail Lanier Challenge leader board, remains Ischabibbel with 47 points, followed by Breaking More Wind with 40 points. And rounding out the top three is Pain Killer with 37 points.

Kirk Out!

It was, quite simply put, not only one of the best Reggae events, but possibly one of the very best regattas Lake Lanier has hosted in quite a long time. The planning and execution of the event, by all appearances, was seamless and smooth-not exactly an easy task. And when you throw a great party, with good music and fabulous libations, your success rate goes up substantially.

Vice Commodore Mike Krantz and his band of volunteer organizers, led by Linda Baker, worked tirelessly to make sure everything was perfect. From the galley staff and race management teams, to the tasty Cuban food and libations, everything was just great. It would be impossible for me to try and list the scores of folks that worked to pull off this event, so I won't even try. But if you attended, I'm sure you can remember those that worked so that the rest of us could enjoy. Be sure to thank them!

Then on top of all that, there was the racing. I don't have the exact numbers yet, but the overall turnout of boats, from the big sport boat down to the little Optimist, was exceptional. And I can't remember a past Reggae with such great wind. Sailors had the best of all worlds. Saturday, all the boats were met with exceptional breezy conditions which kept the racing hot and exciting. Sunday brought another beautiful day. While lighter in comparison to Saturday's wind, there was still enough breeze to get the fleets off. And as the day progressed, the boats were able to finish in a nice stand of pressure. It was an exceptional weekend of racing.

With the breeze on Saturday, the Sail Lanier camera was not afforded too many opportunities to grab happy snaps. Sunday, however, was a bit different. There are not a lot of pics here, but find some of what I was able to capture on the Strictly Sailing Photo site.

Once this leg is over, there will be but two short legs left to conclude this event. Shortly there after Sail Lanier will be able to announce the winner of the $100.00 gift certificate at Layline. In the coming days, I will outline that entire how that will unfold.

Also, the results to last Wednesday's AISC race #8 are now posted and ready for your review at the AISC Website.

Kirk Out!

We had a nice night of AISC racing last evening. Still recovering from a pulled back injury, your editor was aboard Stickman as usual, but he didn't do crap. Railmeat he was. Probably more in the way than anything else, but so what. It's a great job, with a great view, and a great break from pulling those damn strings. But best of all, it provided me with an opportunity to take some happy snaps of some of the action. Check them out at the Strictly Sailing Photos.

Also in other AISC news, the Commodore would like to remind AISC members of the following, which is also posted on the AISC Website.

• Participants in the Wednesday night post race activities should keep their speed down when driving through LLSC. We have had some complaints about excessive speed by some drivers.
• If you are doing food duty at LLSC, please make sure the kitchen is cleaned up when you are done.
• All participants in the Wednesday night post race need to do their part to leave the place as nice or nicer than it was before the party started. Please throw out your plates/utensils/cans etc. Also if you spill food or drink, clean it up. Chairs and tables should be put back where they belong before you leave as well. If you are the last to leave, turn off the lights and make sure the place is locked up properly before you leave.

And in other new, the LLPHRF Committee held its June meeting this past Tuesday and reviewed one new application. Those results are posted on the LLPHF Website.

Kirk Out!

Now, don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with a gorgeous winter weekend and we certainly had our fair share this year. However, there is something about late spring, when the thermals set in. Sunshine and warmth man, that is what it's all about. It is kind of like what my bride says, "We humans are solar powered." And I guess it is true, after a good weekend of getting a little sunshine on my skin, I do feel better.

Now, the bad news. All humans are solar powered, which means, the first really nice weekend also brings out every knucklehead mariner this side of the northwestern prevailing winds.

I'm not necessarily talking about the seasonal stink potter. Or even the steadfast card carrying members of Fenderpalooza, and there were plenty of them to be found. Those folks keep a special place in my heart.

No, I'm talking about the knuckleheaded blow-boater. The guy or gal that probably hasn't seen the boat in, most likely, over a year. And now they decide the first really nice weekend of the year is the best time to take up where they left off.

To the great relief of their regular and well attended dock-mates, they spent most all of Saturday cleaning their boats. It's about time!

And, as a side note, my heart goes out to the guy that spent the entire day scrubbing, cleaning, and even polishing his MacGregor 26X. There are a couple simple principles in life one must realize. First off, you can't cure stupid. And secondly, when it comes to the 26X, and most other things really, you can't clean ugly. Those are just laws of nature that can't be altered. I'm pretty sure they can be found in the bible, somewhere.

Anyway, with the boat now relatively clean. Sunday was the day to launch and get underway. And most all of them did, incredibly over canvassed and into the beautiful dark green water marked with solid whitecaps. So I just sat back and watched. SLAM! SLAM! BROACH! BROACH! Simply put, the entertainment value of the knucklehead blow-boater can be priceless.

And when they had had enough of getting their asses kicked and their three hour cruise was over, they left their Sunday afternoon at the lake in the rear view mirror with a clean boat in the slip. And as they pulled away, I simply waved and said, "See you guys next year!"

Kirk Out!

With all the rain we had yesterday, we may very well hit the 1066 mark. That would put us only 5 feet from full pool. And they said it was going to be another drier than normal spring. Well Kurt Mellish, you got that one wrong. And, I couldn't be happier.

Also, we got more happy snaps. Joe Seymour, friend of Tom Graham, was helping out with RC duties last Wednesday night and took a crap-load of great photos. He has organized and processed them for everyone's enjoyment. He is also willing to get Tom some DVD's of the shoot if folks want a copy for personal use. There are over 150 pics and many are just great. Enjoy them here at the J Seymour Jr. Gallery.

Kirk Out!

To begin with, in the event you have not seen, the AISC Wednesday Night race #6 results are up on the AISC website.

The folks sailing in the Sail Lanier Group Challenge made short work of the leg between Boston and Galway, Ireland. Of course, ED is still out there and probably won't finish until sometime tomorrow.

However, hats off to our top three challengers. Pain Killer was first over the line with an over all ranking of 551st in the entire event; not shabby at all. Breaking More Wind came in second and Why Knotticle rounded the board out in third place. With only three short legs remaining, the boats will need to be ready to get under way one more time on the 6th of June.

Lake Lanier Sailing Club hosted the 2009 PHRF Championships on Saturday the 23rd of May. Based on the fact that they got four solid races in, it must have been a great day to mix it up. Eleven boats created the single fleet, but despite the several sport boats that were in attendance, it would be Rob Whitley's J-24 Wild Card that would ultimately prevail. Congrats! See the results below.

Race #1; Race #2;
Race #3; Race #4; Overall Results

That should be easy enough since yesterday the Southern Sailing Club (SSC) held it's Master's Regatta event, more affectionately known as the "Old Fart's Race". Skippers must be at least 50 years of age and helm the boat for the entire race. The rules to qualify are pretty simple.

Larry Cost, who turns 50 later this year, was disappointed and rather upset that race organizers dismissed his request to have the "day of the event" age requirement waived. I questioned Southern Race Commodore Joey Duran about Mr. Cost and whether their could be any latitude given to accommodate his request and he simply replied, "F%&k him."

So there you have it, a hard stance was taken by race committee and the integrity of the event rules stand. In the end Mr. Cost had to crew for old fart John Martin and will have to wait until next year to qualify for the event. Till then, he's still just a fart.

The race was a simple seven miler from X mark to eleven, back to an A mark finish with island thirteen somewhere in the middle of both legs. Good pressure was had for the entire race and the rain held off until towards the end.

Congratulations go out to Dean Holcomb as he took top honors in the High Performance Fleet with Rumrunner his Pinnacle 30. Pat Higgins squeezed out his tough competition with borrowed boat Griffin, a C&C 36. And George Chretien aboard Moon Struck, a Hunter 35.5 had his way with the Cruising Fleet. Congratulations again to all.

Kirk Out!

We started 2 hours early at 8:00am today, the forecast was for 10 knots out of the SE, and with a 102 mile leg we were expecting a long day. It was a another rough surf launch (not as bad as yesterday) and a 5 mile beat up to the St Mary's jetty. The fleet pretty much rounded the jetty together, and there was a decision to be made - run downwind on the rhumbline for 98 miles (which takes you 37 miles offshore), or gybe for the beach, and follow the coastline in search of more seabreeze (however the coastline route adds about 20 miles to the course). Dave and I were the first boat that opted to gybe for the coastline, because we could see numerous clouds building inland and they generally suggest stronger onshore wind. Several hours later, we see another spinnaker on the horizon gybed over to join us, and then about 60 miles into the leg another boat comes over the horizon to join us also. We're feeling pretty good since the breeze is now up to about 15 knots, and we're making 20 knots up the coast. We still don't know if we've made the right decision, there are 20 boats out there that we cannot account for... At about 10 miles out from Tybee we can begin to see the boats on the horizon that sailed the rhumbline. It's too close to tell at this point, whether we are ahead or behind. It turns out that we made the right choice, we converge ahead of the pack and finish 5th for the day. Today's run was one of the fastest of the week. It started out slow with us covering 45 miles in the first 4 hours, then we blistered off the remaining 75 miles in the next 4 hours.

We finished 7th overall for the week. We woulda, shoulda, coulda placed 3rd had we not lost over 2 hours between breaking down yesterday and OCS on day 1 - but that's sailboat racing.

We covered 547 nautical miles with an elapsed time of 2 days 4 hrs and 28 mins on an 18 foot catamaran with two crew. We lived on powerbars, apples, Cytomax, and Josie's Jerky...

It was a great week of sailing, and thanks to all of you that cheered us on! And special thanks to our ground crew: Hank Goodman - team manager, Dave Krantz - writer and head gofer, Rebecca Krantz and Renee Lennard - team wives and financial consultants...

-Mike Krantz and David Lennard
Team Zhik / Layline

SL would like to extend a huge thanks to Mike and David for providing the exclusive Team Zhik updates over the past week. I have received many compliments about the coverage as several folks were keeping up with the team's run up the beach. That's cool!

And on another note: I am always trying to improve the presentation of information and images here at SailLanier. So, starting with this post, most featured images can be clicked on to see a larger version. Try it now by clicking on either of the Team Zhik pictures.

Kirk Out!

And the Team Zhik coverage continues. Today is the start of the last leg of the Tybee 500. And based on the video coverage provided by On The Water Anarchy this mornings launch was far better than yesterday. This morning the fleet had breeze to get going, and that's in stark contrast to yesterday's start from Dayton. Mike and David had more than their fair share of shit to deal with, but we will let Mike give us the run down. Here is his report that came in late last night.

(Leg #5 - Daytona Beach to Fernandina)
Black Friday...

I looked out the window this morning and knew it was going to be a tough day. Maybe 3 knots of breeze and a big surf to launch through with a strong onshore current.

The gun goes off, we push off into the surf, make it about 50 yards and get hit by a big breaker. We fought the current and waves not making much headway for about a mile paralleling the beach, and then the tiller arm universal breaks. We turn around and head back to the beach. We dig a universal out of our spare parts kit on the boat, fix the rudders and attempt to start again. At this point it's been a half an hour, and half the boats have managed to clear the surf, some are on the beach making repairs, and several are still battling the surf trying to clear the breakers.

We relaunch a second time, and spend over 1/2 hour punching into the waves, and getting knocked back. Eventually we catch a big wave broadside, get turned sideways and shear off a rudder bracket. Back to the beach again for parts and by this time the trailer is over a mile down the beach. Bjorn and Daryl of Team Seacats ground crew are there to help us. They call someone in the parking lot, who grabs our spare rudder assembly, and starts running down the beach our way. They meet halfway, and are back at the boat shortly. We repair the boat again, and relaunch. David and I are pretty exhausted at this point, but we aren't giving up. For the third time we relaunch into the surf, and finally make it out - 1 hour and 48 minutes after the gun. The last team to successfully make it through the surf...

We head north and there is no one on the horizon. We set the spinnaker and off we go. The breeze has finally filled in and we're making about 12 knots. 30 minutes later our port rudder snaps off. There is no way we are going back to the beach for parts and relaunching in the surf. We pull whats left of the rudder system off and steer using the main and jib only. I cobble together a single working rudder and tiller using what we had on board. Attach it and we're back up to speed finally. Dave and I put the hammer down, and sailed the 97 mile leg in 7 hrs 2 mins passing a handful of boats in the last 20 miles. FWIW, the 1st boat to finish sailed the course in 7 hrs and 31 mins. However add our 1 hr and 48 mins battling the surf and we had a very bad day...

Tomorrow's the last leg and it is the longest, most treacherous, and very remote. If you break down, you're pretty much on your own. 102 miles on the rhumbline, but that takes you 35 miles offshore and it rarely pays. Following the shoreline, crossing a bunch of sounds, sandbars, etc is normally the quickest course, but it adds about 30 miles to the trip.

The forecast isn't favorable so RC has moved up the start to 8:00am.

Wish us luck.

Mike and Dave
Team Zhik

Now back to Team Zhik and the Tybee 500. And before we talk about the yesterday's leg to Daytona, lets fill in some gaps for the previous one. If you will recall, a late day at the office prevented Mike and David from sending in a timely report. Well, later the next morning and before the start he got me the goods. So let's first hear about leg #3.

(Leg #3 - Jupiter Beach to Cocoa Beach)
Definitely a long day yesterday.

The forecast was for 10-20, which would have made a short day, but we never saw more than 10 knots, mostly 5 or less.

At the start there were a couple of big thunderstorms offshore, so a group of 10 boats headed offshore to chase the thunderstorms, dodge lightning, and use what little wind we could hook into., 14 boats chose to stick to the shoreline.

We went outside and chased the storms about 15 miles offshore maintaining 10-15 knots of boatspeed for the first 3 hours. The storms started dissipating, so 8 of us decided to head back to shore while we could, and two boats stayed out a little longer. When we got back to shore, not another boat was in sight. That could be really good, or really bad...

After several hours of working our way north up the shore, still no other boats in sight, other than the pack of 8 boats that came in with us. 13 hours later we made landfall in Cocoa. The two boats that stayed offshore, finished 2 hours ahead of us, and the pack that stayed inshore were several hours behind us.

We sailed good, but not good enough, and actually lost a couple of places overnight. Today's leg is 78 miles. The forecast is 3 to 6 knots along shore, however we have a 15 mile long, 3 mile offshore security zone around Cape Canaveral.

Don't wait up for us...
-Mike

And now, here is the Team Zhik report for leg #4.

(Leg #4 - Cocoa Beach to Daytona Beach)
Today started bright and sunny with a forecast of 4 to 6 out of the southeast. Sounds good for Wed night racing, but not so good for a 78 mile leg...

We punch off the beach into 6+ foot rollers, and a lot of the fleet has problems getting out. We managed to time our launch fairly well, and were one of the first couple of boats to clear the breakers.

Most of the breeze is in the surf but today, we've got to round Cape Canaveral and there is a shuttle on the pad. They've imposed a 3 mile security zone, which makes it about a 35 mile trip around the cape using the offshore path.

It was slow going all day. We did hook into one micro-burst early on and hit 22 knots on about a 25 minute sleigh-ride. Most of the rest of the day was spent at 10 knots or less coasting from zephyr to zephyr. We finished at 8:04pm after 10 hours on the water.

Tomorrow's leg is Daytona to Fernandina Beach - 97 miles. The forecast is not much better, with more thunderstorms expected. It will be another long day at the office...

Mike and David
Team Zhik

Thanks for the report guys and the best of wishes for a great day on the water tomorrow. We also can't forget about Tad and the Velocity Sailing Syndicate. They have done a nice job keeping up with their posts on the website, so check in on them from time to time as well.

And remember, you can get reports that cover the entire event, plus catch tons of pictures taken at the starts and finishes at the Tybee 500 Website.

Kirk Out!

And a long day it was, per the unofficial reports, Team Zhik hit the beach about fifteen minutes before midnight at about 9th overall. We'll see once the actual scoring is posted later.

Team Velocity had a long day of it too. Tad on TVS 2 hit the beach just before 2 am with a couple more TVS boats still yet to finish. Sleep tight boys and girls, the starting gun comes mighty early for your run up to Daytona!

And for what it's worth, today's run will have the fleet passing the restrictive waters of Cape Canaveral. This will have the fleet follow a string of waypoints keeping them three miles offshore for the pass. Luckily, the scheduled shuttle launch went well the other day. Had it been forced to reschedule to today, the restrictive waters would have been extended to over 100 miles. This would have forced the fleet to pack up and trailer to Daytona. But that's not the case, so we will have racing today.

And the folks at Gill are having another great sale at the warehouse in Buford. On 30 May the doors will open from 0900 to 1500 and offer never heard of opportunities to save big. For more info, Click Here.

Now back to more updates from the Team Zhik. Mike and David have now completed two legs and will soon be waking up to start a new day and leg; a very long leg at that! Let's see what Mike has to say:

Well race fans after yesterday's 87 mile drag race we thought that today would be an easy 63 mile run from Hollywood to Jupiter. We had 10 knots out of the southeast at the start, which made for a quick spinnaker set off the beach, turn left, and head north for Jupiter. It turns out that the breeze was stronger on the beach than offshore, so we would sail out out about a mile or so, and then gybe back to the swim buoys off the beach. Fifty-two gybes later we hit the finish line on the beach. We took a third place finish today, and moved up to 4th overall.

Tomorrow's going to be a long day - Jupiter to Cocoa Beach, 102 miles as the crow flies.- Mike

Get more updates at the official Tybee 500 Website
And don't forget to check out ow things are going at the Team Velocity camp

Also, I'm just a little pissed this morning. I just got through clearing out all the messages and topics (a couple thousand actually) from SL's Starboard Tack forum. Seems some asshole filled it with bullshit porn and the like. I got a heads-up on it (no pun intended) from a SL user. And when I went in this morning, the little bastard was logged on and posting away. Well, I have given that user the nix. Unfortunately, the only efficient way to kill the more than 1300 posts was to wipe the slate clean.

Now, there is nobody to blame here but little old me. I am the administrator of the forum and I should have been playing closer attention. I thought about just removing the entire platform since it hasn't seen a lot of activity, but I decided to just clear it and give it another chance. I do believe it could be a great tool, if it is promoted properly. And oh yeah, I haven't done a very good job of that either. I suck!

Kirk Out!

Local Sailors Head to Tybee!

The Tybee 500 is comprised of six days of fast, furious and exhausting racing; completing a different leg each day. Starting off the coast of the Islamorada on May 11th, they will work their way north making 5 stops along the Florida coast until reaching their ultimate destination; a finish own Tybee Island, GA. Florida stops in between will consist of Hollywood, Jupiter, Cocoa Beach, Daytona Beach and Fernandina Beach.

Competitors will have to choose from one of two classes of catamaran; the F-18 or the Inter-20. And there is a limit of 30 total entries in the event with 8 or more of each making up a class. Currently, per the event website, 24 teams have registered with enough boats to complete each class.

And, as an interest to the Sail Lanier community, it should be known that we have a couple dogs in the Tybee 500 fight. Yes, Lake Lanier will be well represented at this year’s event with the entries of Team Zhik and Team Velocity Racing. Both teams are familiar with the event having participated in the past, and each is raring to go in 2009.

Team Zhik is composed of Mike Krantz and David Leonard. They have been sailing together for years. No strangers to offshore coastal racing, this will be their third trip to Tybee. Racing on a Nacra 20 in both of their previous attempts, they enjoyed significant success placing second in each of those events.

This year they will be mounting an F-18 for the trip north. This is significant because, consequently, no F-18 has ever been able to complete this race. Mike and David plan to be the first. However, it won’t be easy, as the fleet of F-18s will play host to a great pool of talent to include sailors from abroad, former world and Olympic champions.

Team Velocity Sailing (TVS) is the largest catamaran syndicate in North America and it is co-founded by local sailor Tad Pecorak. From its humble beginning in 2004 while drifting on a NACRA 6.0 on a becalmed Lake Wheeler, TVS has grown to an impressive five boat team supported by a host of sponsors. Tad likes to think of it as, “NASCAR for catamarans”. “We are stoked!” he said during a recent Wednesday night race. “We have all five boats heading to Tybee and we’ve signed US Olympian Carrie Howe to skipper the fifth boat, TVS5. It’s going to be a blast.”

Tad will be skippering TVS2, a Nacra Inter 20, along with his crew Bailey White of Atlanta. This will also be Tad’s third time participating in the event.

For those of us that have an interest in following the race, there will be many avenues on the Internet that will be providing coverage. To begin with, team reports for our boys from Lanier will be posted to the Team Velocity Sailing website as well as the Team Zhik Blog. But you will also find coverage at the following websites: the official Tybee 500 website, Catamaran Sailor, Team Seacats, and of course Sailing Anarchy.

Sail Lanier would like to extend a hearty “Good Luck” to both local teams. And it’s my hope that both will serve up a healthy plate of “Whoop Ass” to the other competitors.

Kirk Out!

The Barefoot Sailing Club is hosting a FREE Race Committee training class to be held this weekend Saturday, May 9th at the Clubhouse on the Sunrise Cove Marina property. The training will be conducted by Edith Collins and it will begin at 10 AM and run until about 1 PM.

This is a great opportunity for first timers and those still new to racing to get exposed to the race management side of things. Learning to set up a good course, the flags, the sequences, the starts and finishes will only improve your understanding of things on the race course. It is not a bad idea for RC and racing veterans to attend as well. It never hurts to get a refresher on that perspective of the race.

So come on out and attend, then seek to get involved and volunteer to assist a scheduled event (we only have them almost every Wednesday night) Once you sit and learn the basics, there is no substitute for getting real experience. Plus, once the boats get started, it's the best seat in the house. I just wish I could have my Lazy Boy while out there.

Kirk Out!

Much of the success of any regatta boils down to the racing, and with that being the benchmark, no one could be disappointed in how the events unfolded. Day one started out kind of light, however, as the day progressed condition steadily increased. As the last boat was approaching the weather mark for its final run downhill, plenty of rain and weather was quickly marching down the lake and into the race course. With four races under the belt, it was time to go in.

On day two, the winds that were left on the lake the first day were still there waiting for them on day two; perhaps a touch more. In and out of white caps, the racers had a blast for the rest of the day to include little William Stoval. To be his first race ever, he held up quite well given the conditions. I believe it can be predicted that not unlike watching a good Disney movie, he will probably want to do this racing thing, over and over again. Good job Dad!

The Sail Lanier camera was on station for the event and burned up some disk space. I have posted the pics from each day on my Flickr account and they may be enjoyed there.
Cinco de Mayo Regatta (day one)
Cinco de Mayo Regatta (day two)

Results will be made available soon at the Lake Lanier Sailing Club website.

In other reporting, the results from the last AISC Wednesday Night racing is available now at the AISC Website.

Kirk Out!

A tip of the hat does go out to Peter Nicholson of Blew Job as he takes top honors this leg. Followed by another newbie, Missy Yeager in Why Knotticle. And while a leg win still eludes him, Chip Kruse in Ischkabibbel finds himself again in the top three by securing a solid third. Well done!

Visit again soon, I will have the leader board updated once a few more boats cross the line!

On May 9th, The Southern Sailing Club (SSC) will host its Lormand Cup Open. This is a singlehanded event open to all lake sailors. The entry fee is the standard Lincoln (that would be $5.00 for you slow folks). So, if you are fed up with your crew, dump them and come on out and play. And in other SSC news, the club was unsuccessful in pulling off their annual event, The Masters Regatta (affectionately known as the OLD FARTS RACE). This is an open event welcoming all skippers, 50 years senior and over. If you missed the last abandonment, you still have time to come out and play. The event has been rescheduled for May 17th. So, for you old farts out there, grab your crew, a five dollar bill, and come race. Those that already registered, need not pay again. Details can be found on the Southern Website.

Kirk Out!