2016 Pacific Cup - A wild start

by Pressure-Drop.US on 15 Jul 2016 2016 Pacific Cup - In complete contrast to Tuesday's start, as the marine layer thinned and receded for the fleet, Thursdays Division D start was a rambunctious affair with the nine boats reefing down and layering up for the thickening fog bank and 20-25 knot winds on the start area.

Stacked with shorthanded talent, the Club Swan 42' Elusive are another threat in this stacked division.

All of the boats in the fleet are veteran ocean racers, save J-Worlds Hula Girl which is pay to play affair, but Wayne Zittel, the boats skipper doesn't back down on the line, and all boats charged in simultaneously, as one might expect in the and evenly matched buoy race.

The original SC 50 Chasch Mer is the fleet sentimental favorite. The original SC 50 built in the chicken coop in Soquel in 1979 for Randy Parker and she had an illustrious record in Transpacs. Now owned by Gib Black and living in Hawaii, she is crewed by a mostly Nor Cal crew and should receive a hero's welcome in Kaneohe.

Shauna Bagley Howe and Mark Howe invested in the modified SC 50 Adrenalin just over a year ago and have been eyeballing this event ever since. Shauna insists that the journey is more important than just the results and bends over backwards to make sure her crew are happy and well taken care of, but that doesn't mean they won’t get every knot of speed out of the boat all the way to Hawaii!

With four SC 50's, two 46' boats, a 42', a 41' all powered up, Rufus Sjobergs Melges 32' Rufless was the runt of the litter, but make no mistake, the five guys on the evil clown boat are going to leave nothing on the table and will push the boat to its max, and have the potential to win this whole race outright, if they don't fumble and the boat don't break!

The four SC 50's were pretty side by side at Point Bonita, Oaxaca with Liz Baylis calling the shots looks to be the favorite with an early lead. The D division has about a 30 mile light air patch to get through before latching onto a strong northerly that should propel them toward Kaneohe in a hurry.