As this article in the Squamish Chief tries to convey to a non-sailing audience, there was a ton of breeze. The reliable thermal showed up hard.
Canadian 5O5 fleet 1 thanks Phil Cragg, an early and constant supporter of the event, who provided his personal motor yacht to the race committee and drove it up from Vancouver to ensure that the regatta would be feasible. Without his drive and encouragement, this regatta wouldn’t have happened.
The race committee did a great job in very deep water and tons of breeze. RO Rob Woodbury, a Olympian in the Finn, and his team Bev Parslow of West Van YC, Mike Unger, Martin Peircy, Andy Hunt and Simeon Faehndrich were very professional and effective.
Fred Grimm took on the thankless task of running shore operations with grace and a smile and kept everyone fed.
Cynthia Des Brisay did the results and Charles Hansen and Brian Trainor did things too numerous to mention with thoughtfulness and generosity.
Kits Yacht Club hosted the event with support from WVYC and SYC.
There would not have been a Canadians if it weren't for the support of the American fleet, who came out in numbers on the Canada Day holiday. (I hope you guys are having a great Fourth!)
Phil Cragg and Reto Corfu leapt to a convincing lead and widened it during the first day, though Mats Elf and Brent Campbell got a foreshadowing bullet when the breeze continued to build at the end of the afternoon. Mats and Brent kept them coming and managed to just edge the Canadians out by the narrowest of margins after two races in 30 knots on Sunday. As Phil aptly put it, the trophy for top Canadian was bittersweet. Paul Von Grey and Miles Johannessen put in a consistently solid performance for 3rd.
What the results don't show, except perhaps by the number of DNS, RET and and DNFs, was that there were times when Squamish harbour looked like a giant nautical yard sale, with capsized boats scattered all over the bay. That said, there were tons of grins on peoples' faces when they got ashore. The speeds were unbelievable. And there were some stand out performances by all. A tip of the hat to Jon and Mike, who had moments of brilliance upwind going low and fast. Also Pierre and Tom - travelling the furthest and putting in a solid performance until an unfortunate strain injury took them out. Hope you come back next time. Tell the other Californians what they missed. Katherine and Josh had a super solid last race, placing 3rd in the strongest winds of the day.
The final rankings:
| Sail | Nat | Names | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | T | N | R |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8823 | USA | Elf / Campbell | (3) | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 10 | 7 | 1 |
| 8192 | CAN | Cragg / Corfu | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 2 | (6) | 14 | 8 | 2 |
| 80 | USA | Johannessen / Von Grey | 2 | (4) | 3 | 2 | 4 | 2 | 17 | 13 | 3 |
| 9116 | USA | Long / Dyck | 6 | (7) | 5 | 6 | 6 | 3 | 33 | 26 | 4 |
| 8755 | CAN | Trainor / Jennings | 7 | (8) | 4 | 5 | 7 | 5 | 36 | 28 | 5 |
| 8263 | USA | Kowalski / Ginther | 5 | 9 | 6 | (12 DNS) | 5 | 4 | 41 | 29 | 6 |
| 8866 | CAN | Des Brisay / Hansen | 8 | 3 | 9 | (12 DNS) | 3 | 12 RET | 47 | 35 | 7 |
| 6991 | USA | Starks / Flanagan | 9 | 6 | 7 | 4 | (12 DNS) | 12 DNS | 50 | 38 | 8 |
| 8631 | USA | Jeangirard / Crawford | 4 | 5 | 8 | (12 DNS) | 12 DNS | 12 DNS | 53 | 41 | 9 |
| 8017 | USA | Seestrom / Poulos | 11 | (12 DNF) | 10 | 12 RET | 12 RET | 12 DNS | 69 | 57 | 10 |
| 7206 | USA | Fitzpatrick / Pittack | 10 | (12 RET) | 12 DNS | 12 DNS | 12 DNS | 12 DNS | 70 | 58 | 11 |
Photos: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0ByL2DIuIzu5obGZWNFEzQ0dpd2s
After reading your post I can very much say that the Championship must have been a very challenging one. I will participate in this event next year.
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