Cal 20 Fun Run - Ives-Stevens tandem bags top prize

by Rick Roberts on 9 Dec 2012 The Cal 20 Fun Run 2012 came to a thrilling finish as the tandem of Keith Ives and Chuck Stevens overcame the difficulty presented by light winds and sneaked past their rivals to bag the overall crown on Saturday at the Long Beach Yacht Club.

During this season of brotherly love and kindness toward your fellow man the aggressiveness and tight racing of the local Cal 20 fleet gives way to… well… aggressive and tight racing that is a bit more subdued in the annual Cal 20 Fun Run hosted by Long Beach Yacht Club.

Keith Ives and Chuck Stevens, Alamitos Bay Yacht Club, took first place honors Saturday against 11 other Cal 20s in what started out as a most challenging day.

Text Box: Keith Ives (at helm) and Chuck Stevens fought for position at every mark rounding in winning the 2012 Cal 20 Fun Run. With a solid overcast and virtually no breeze the race committee postponed for more than an hour before they sent everyone off in 3-4 knots of wind.

'It was really hard,' Ives said. 'We really appreciated the [race committee] running the races for us.'

Once the first race was completed the wind stayed consistent allowing a full eight races on the day. All of them were tightly bunched with regular lead changes from race to race.

'We weren’t exactly sure where we were in the results,' Ives said, 'but figured that the last race decided it.'

Second place went to Sam Heck and Chris Raab, ABYC, who were only three points behind Ives and Stevens and third place on the day went to Chuck Clay, also of ABYC.

Unlike most of the Cal 20 regattas held in the sometimes chop and heavy breeze of Long Beach Harbor, this event is held in the shelter of Alamitos Bay’s Turning Basin. This traditional holiday-time regatta puts the emphasis on fun with joking and well wishes heard from boat to boat. It’s a good old fashioned day of racing with friends and family. The five-buck entry fee is handed to the race committee whaler on the water. No skippers meetings, no formalities, just a fun time for all.

Trophies are given out to the top finishers at the race committee boat and everyone sails back to their respective club to relax and reflect on the day’s racing . Because of the ‘Fun Run’ theme, protests are discouraged in the Notice of Race.