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2008 J/22 World Championships
Lake George Fleet 61 Is Well-Represented in Rochester
by Rex Moon, with contributions from Tom Linville and Bill Dutcher
The 2008 J/22 World Championship Regatta was held last week in Rochester, NY and our own Fleet 61 was well represented by six of our boats. Attending from Lake George were Tom Linville and the Evolution crew, Frank “Cheech” Nigro and the Windog crew, Bob Miller and the La Forza crew, Bill Dutcher and the Joy crew, RJ Moon and the Moonlighting crew and Amir Mujezinovic and his crew on Jupiter.
In addition to our team and the other U.S. sailors, there were sailors from the Netherlands, the Virgin Islands, France, Canada, Argentina and the Republic of South Africa. One hundred and five boats were a sight to see all lined up in the parking lot, and on the water the view was breathtaking.
The regatta was preceded by a tune-up regatta and Hospice benefit on Saturday Aug. 16, with good winds and a fair number of the competitors participating. From Sunday Aug. 17 until Tuesday Aug 19 registration and measuring took place. Measurement is the process of assuring all the boats and competitors complied with the one-design J/22 Class Rules; one-design meaning all the boats are as alike as possible. At this important regatta measurement was unusually thorough, with checks of sails, hulls (especially keels), rigging, safety equipment, and crew weight.
The measurement operation was a sight to see, with a building the size of an airplane hanger fitted out with stations to completely check the 105 attending boats. Lead was flying, bondo was being added, the buffers were humming and rigs were being fine-tuned as boats and competitors weighed in for the competition. Most of our boats fared well. However, Moonlighting, even after much checking this spring, had to do some minor surgery, moving the mast step and supporting structure forward five millimeters and the rudder up five millimeters. Evolution also had to add a millimeter to the trailing edge of her rudder. Tom “That Scale Can’t Be Right” Linville managed, after negotiating and re-measuring, to convince the committee his keel was OK and that no additional lead weight was needed.
Racing started on Wed., but the wind was disappointing that first day. Three races were planned per day, but in the first race the course was shortened and many competitors still did not finish within the half-hour time limit after the first boat. So almost half the fleet ÒtiedÓ at 64th place. The Race Committee and the competitors waited and worried as an 80-plus-degree high settled in over the area. Bill Dutcher managed a 24th place finish in the only race of the day, with all of our other boats stuck in the time-limit-expired tie for 64th place.
On Thursday the wind kicked in around noon and three races were run as planned with the competitors getting in off the water around 6:30 p.m. At the end of the day Chris Doyle, the J/22 Class President, was in the lead with Greg Fisher (North Sails, Annapolis), Jimmy Barnash (Rochester), Flip Wehrheim (Rochester), and others all biting at his heels. After traveling to regattas in Buffalo and Youngstown and sailing in Rochester, all in the last three years with the same crew, RJ Moon’s Moonlighting, skippered by John Newell of Rochester with RJ calling tactics and flying the spinnaker, took the lead of the Lake George boats and never looked back. Bill Dutcher with all of his team’s practice at home, stayed up there in the middle of the pack as well.
Racing continued Friday with three more races held in good winds, similar to Thursday. On Saturday, the wind was OK for two morning races, but then died in the afternoon, so all the boats were towed back to the yacht club boat basin. On Sunday the RC called for an earlier start and planned two races. The first race completed on time, and the RC hastened to start another race before the 12:00 cutoff time. The race was started, but the wind was dying and like the first race, the time limit expired for several boats.
In one of the races on Friday Bob Miller pulled off a great start at one end of the line and was gone. Unfortunately being gone with a 1.7 mile upwind leg and two times around course leaves a lot of time for some very good sailors from all over the world to catch up. But for the first ten to 15 minutes of that race, Bob knew what it was like to look back at the huge fleet behind him and enjoy totally clean air. Nice start, Bob !
When I say one end of the line, the line was almost a half-mile long and had three RC boats. The main RC signal boat was in the middle and there were RC flag boats at each end. Watching 105 J/22s all lined up with sails luffing with 30 seconds to go was a sight to see. There were three or four general recalls during the regatta, a number of boats over early and some serious penalties handed out when the I and Z flags were used.
The conditions experienced in Rochester on Lake Ontario were considerably different than those we are used to on Lake George. First of all, the courses were well offshore, two to three miles, so one could not use shore objects for positional reference. The wind shifted in both velocity and direction (as much as 20 degrees during a leg), making tactics of being in the right place, tacking (or gybing) on the shifts, and closely observing the progress of competitors across the course essential for success. Getting a good start by choosing the right end of the line and accelerating off the line were extremely important. And, finding good lanes of clear air, both upwind and down, was not always easy. Lastly, the waves (while not large, due to mostly southerly or easterly winds) were a factor, as was the small westerly flowing current.
In the end it was Greg Fisher from Annapolis, the current North American champion, who earned first place and was crowned the 2008 J/22 Class World Champion, with a truly remarkable and outstanding performance. His team only had one poor finish (the first race, which became his throwout), along with a 12th, but all eight of his other races were in the top ten. He was followed by Anthony Kotoun of the Virgin Islands, Flip Wehrheim from Rochester, Chris Doyle from Youngstown, Bill Hardesty, Pete McChesney, Jim Barnash, Todd Hiller, Rob Johnstone and Allan Tehune in the top ten places. Only Todd Hiller managed to win two races in the ten-race (of 13 planned) series. Each of the other eight races was won by a different team.
All in all, the regatta was a great success for The Rochester Yacht Club whose planning committee chaired by Mark Sertl and Jimmy Barnash and the club management produced an eight-day event that was second to none. It was also a success for the six Lake George boats, if not for their finishing position then certainly for the learning; everyone I spoke to felt like they were soaking up experience and knowledge all the way. And I think all have caught the bug — regatta participation is critical for improving performance.
Congratulations to all of the Lake George Fleet 61 competitors and all of the sailors who attended from seven countries around the world. Next year the J/22 Worlds are in Lake Garda, Italy. Joy’s crew is so enthusiastic that they are discussing participating there.
For those sailors whose travel interest is piqued, there are also a number of great regattas throughout the Northeast and the U.S. in 2009.