Velocity Sailing

First things first.

My apologies for not getting any updates yesterday.  It was quite a stressful time on the beach waiting for the boats to arrive while standing in torential downpours and lightning striking all around me.  Once Tybee came in, I started getting real nervous since Velocity hadn’t been but a couple of minutes either behind or in front of Tybee all race except for the legs where we had mechanical failures.

Apparently, according to Kenny Pierce, Tybee caught the front end of a nice squall about 30 miles into the race.  When they came out of the squall, no other teams could be found.  Velocity and Marley’s Yellow came in an hour later after Tybee, literally on top of each other (But Velocity in front!)

This put Velocity overall in 3rd place behind Tybee and Marley’s Yellow.  Overall it was a great week for Velocity.  We clearly had boat speed on the rest of the fleet but we were plagued by just bad luck mechanical failures.  Next year is our year.  Two boats will at least be present for Team Velocity.

Velocity would like to thank all of its sponsors for supporting us this year – particularly DryUV for allowing us to get exposure on SailingAnarchy.com.  We hope to continue our success next year with all our sponsors on board!

Storms are predicted along the coast of Georgia today, and some powerful storms are predicted late tonight in Tybee Island.  The race committee has decided to go ahead and push the start up by an hour so that the teams have extra time to get into the beach and unrig their boats before the storms get truely nasty.  As it is, the SSE breeze at 15-20 knots with higher gusts won’t be fun.  “Damaging Winds” is what the weather service describes it as.  Not fun for lightweight, high-powered catamarans riding swells.  Here is the link to the current Tybee Island Conditions so you can follow along with the action.  St. Simons Island is the last place on this leg where the ground crew can render assistance to the team which is about 50 miles away from the finish.  There’s nothing between there and Tybee thats habitable, developed or accessible

Below is a picture of the eyebolt that let go yesterday and caused all the problems on the beach.  Pity that such a small yet vital part caused our boys to not come in first.

Velocity got a great push from Ryan Boyle and was the first boat to pop their chute.

Go get em boys!

Here’s a picture by James Boicourt of the Jupiter start.  Of course we’re not on the pole position here because of the tiller crossbar fiasco but its still a beautiful picture.  Some of you might recognize James as a ground crew member from years past.  He got a new camera and has decided to come take lots of pictures for us along the way.  He only gives me a couple every once in a while and internet access has been spotty at best.

Team Velocity followed up its bullet yesterday with a strong second place finish today in morw challenging conditions rounding Cape Canaveral.  Velocity lead for most of the race but had to turn back with 2 miles left to race when Alan Stewart fell off the boat.  Trey had to douse the chute and return to Alan who was more than a quarter mile offshore.
The front runners separated themselves from the rest of the fleet today.  There was a little bit of everything as the teams had to respect a 3 mile boundary going around the shuttle on the pad at Cape Canaveral.  One boat lost its mast and had to be towed into Port Canaveral while the above average surf coming into Daytona.  The F18 broke its daggerboard, spin pole and tore its spinnaker up while Marley’s White manged to avoid a capsize in the surf but the rudder system was damaged.
Tomorrow’s leg features the rounding of the Jacksonville Jetty which can cause troubles for the teams if not properly navigated.

Boats got off the beach uneventfully ezcept for the F18 that had daggerboard issues. They returned shortly and then set off again. Breeze is a good 15 from the north and supposed to clock around to the NE later today making the starboard tack favored by far.
At the start, we got a really good push from Ryan and the boys powered up and around Cat in The Hat and picked up at least two places. They were one of the first boats to get the boards down, sails in and double trapped heading to weather.
One thing that the guys mentioned this morning was that they really appreciated having dry gear to put on every morning. Nothing sucks more than having to put on soggy stuff from the day before. Thanks to DryUV’s gear the guys get to put on comfortable gear everyday.
ETA is around 6 tonight. We actually can look for the guys around this part of Florida so we’ll post updates along the way if we see anything.
Tad out.

I knew this particular day could be a real ordeal for the teams.  Westerly Breeze is never fun.  In addition to being dangerous to disabled boats getting blown out to sea, it also has a nasty habit of being very unstable and “puffy”.  The south Floridian high-rise condos that dot the beaches along West Palm Beach and Fort Lauderdale provide what we call “gonzo blasts” where the westerly winds get funneled between two buildings and the wind velocity is amplified.  Westerly breeze also means reaching.  This means that there is a lot of mainsheet work for the crew who is trying to keep the boat balanced on the edge of pure power and self-destruction.  Its very physically challenging. 

Today started with an exciting pushoff.  The team considered backing the boat in, since we weren’t sure that we could keep the boat on the beach.  Everyone got involved, even Trey’s grandfather, to hold the boat down prior to the start.  When the horn blew, I was slow getting off the boat and got a nice roll around in the sand. 

Ryan and I hadn’t been on the road for more than a couple minutes when we received a phone call from Judy Bargeron of the race organization.  She infomed me that she got a call from Brian Karr who had just got off the helicopter pad and said that our boys were in trouble just south of the Fort Everglades Inlet.  From what they could make out from the air, the tiller crossbar was broken and Trey was in the water.  The guys carry a cell phone and VHF radio on board the boat at all times, and we knew that if they needed our help, they would get in touch with us.

We never got a call from the boat.  We assumed that silence was a good thing and we proceeded to Jupiter beach.

Only an hour had gone by when the first boat arrived.  Team Tybee, keeping up their string of impressive victories and had squeezed in just a little early of Marley’s Yellow.  When Steve Lohmayer was done dealing with his boat I approached him and asked him if he knew anything about it.  Apparently he was right next Trey and Alan when they had their incident.  Jay and Steve on Marley’s Yellow hailed Trey to get room to go around a freighter and when Trey went to make the maneuver, he lost his footing on the trapeze and swung around the back and slammed into the tiller crossbar, breaking it in half.  Trey was also separated from the boat in the ordeal.  When the crossbar fell apart, he apparently had to dive underwater to save the (very expensive) tiller extension that was sinking fast.  When he got it, Alan was already using both tillers (one in each hand) to tack the boat back to him.  They finally got back together again and made the repairs.

I’m waiting for pictures of the repair they fashioned, but needless to say that it was quite impressive and would make any boy scout blush.  Two wrenches, two screwdrivers, a tiller arm connector and two rolls of electrical tape and the guys had a functioning crossbar. It got them to the beach but it was slow going having mis-aligned rudders.  The guys are tired tonight and we’re going to get a quick bite to eat before going to catch a movie and then make it an early night.

Picture of the boats leaving Key Largo on Sunday.  Velocity is on the far left without their spin (this was when the tack line broke)

Early start today. The boats had to be on the water at 8:30 in order to squirt through the Jewfish Crreek Bridge all at once. Sometimes this can be quite difficult if the wind is light and the current is pushing in the wrong direction. Fortunately everyone made it through the bridge for the 10AM start without a hitch.

When the ground crew, Ryan and Tad, arrived in Hollywood, the race committee was already on site. We heard from the official Tybee 500 photographer that our boys had some difficulties when coming through the Card Sound bridge. We come to find out later that the internal 2:1 tack line had exploded inside the pole and an “improvised” system had to be fashioned in order to keep the team’s speed up.

The weather conditions started as a 10-15 knot southwest breeze, and then around 2:00pm a storm rolled through Hollywood and killed the wind. When the breeze returned, it was a westerly breeze and gusting as high as 20knots.

Team Velocity rolled in 3rd place, tight on the heels of the Team Tybee and Marley’s Orange boat. As for the the damaged tack line, that has been quickly repaired and the whole system is ready to roll in the morning.

Yes Trey did sail in his graduation cap and yes, there are pictures of him online if you look hard enough.

Photo Credit Amy Turns, tybee500.com

Well, we go grab some lunch and the beach explodes with boats!  The count of teams went from 6 to 10 in the span of a couple hours. 

Wind this morning was very light so we’re waiting on some breeze before Alan and Tad go out and do a shakedown.  You may wonder “Why isn’t Trey going to do the shakedown?”  Funny you ask.  Trey right now is in Raleigh NC.  Thats right.  He drove all the way down to the Florida Keys only to turn around and fly back to NC.  See, today Trey graduates from NC State University.  He’s claiming that he’ll race the first leg of the race with his graduation cap and tassle on.  We’ll see about that.  Congrats to my boy Trey for this great accomplishment.

Speaking of the first leg.  Reports from the local weather guru, Jamie Livingston seems to indicate a southwest to westerly building breeze.  This provides a tactical decision for the teams that can be quite a make-or-break maneuver.  Do they stay inside the Bay, or do they jump out to the ocean at the first opportunity.? If the breeze was from the East, then it would be a no-brainer as you’d want to get out to the clear air as soon as possible.  But coming from the Southwest, the wind will be the same inside the protected water as it would be out in the ocean.  Tonight we’ll pour over some charts and make a call.  Hopefully it will be the fast decision.

As for the status of things on the beach right now;  The race committee is cranking up and having its skippers meeting as I type this up.  They are going through with safety inspections this afternoon to make sure the teams all have the correct safety gear on board.  This includes EPIRB, Whistles, Strobes, Safety Lines, Charts, and of course, PFDs.

Tad out.