Transpac 2001-Three Aussie Boats 3 winners.

by Rich Roberts on 13 Jul 2001 The doubled handed winner Étrange was designed by Scott Jutson and built in Australia in 1994,
completing something of a Down Under sweep. Philippe Kahn's Barn Door-winning Pegasus was McConaghy built and and Seth Radow's overall winner Bull is a brand new Sydney Yachts built Sydney 40-T.

Transpac lists no official doublehanded record, but Howard Gordon's Open 50
Étrange sailed the 2,225 nautical miles with Jay Crum as the only other
crew member in 10 days 4 hours 4 minutes 1 second. That eclipses the
elapsed time of 11:17:51:12 by Blackjack, a MacGregor 65 sailed by Carl
Nelson and John Townsend in 1995, which is believed to be the fastest
Transpac by a two-man crew.

'We had a good time,' Crum said. 'I'd do it again.'

That's easy to believe. Crum, 43, from Soquel, Calif., has now sailed 12
Transpacs and 16 races from the U.S. West Coast to Hawaii. Gordon was
sailing his first, but the two were happy with their performance despite a
handicap rating of 12.717 seconds per mile, sixth lowest in the fleet. With
that, they probably won't even win overall on corrected time among the
three doublehanded entries.

'That's OK,' Crum said. 'We just wanted to go as fast as we could.'

The other two doublehanders - Dan Doyle's Two Guys On the Edge from Hawaii
and Michael Abraham's Watercolors, Newport Beach, Calif. - were expected to
finish Friday and Saturday, respectively. Jorge Morales Mystere, a fully
crewed Swan 42 from Laguna Niguel, Calif., was in a nail-biting battle with
Watercolors for the Tail-end Charlie award.

Étrange's Gordon, a resident of San Luis Obispo, Calif., was off surfing Thursday as
Crum talked about the race.

'We found our limits,' he said. 'It's a big boat and we had to throttle
back just to get rest.'

They got plenty of that the first night out parked in the lee of San
Nicolas Island 70 miles offshore for 12 hours, along with Medicine Man,
Mongoose and Yassou, all of which had to play catch-up the rest of the way.

Their only serious breakdown came 50 miles from the finish when the
spinnaker block broke at the top of the carbon fiber mast. The load on the
internal halyard split the mast down to the top spreaders, forcing them to
finish without a chute. But they weren't discouraged by either of the
reversals.

'You could do the race in eight days with this boat,' Crum said.

TRANSPAC CAMEOS

At a press conference for the winning skippers Thursday, Pegasus crew
member Zan Drejes noted the effect of Transpac increasing the daily roll
calls from one to two.

'It definitely kept the boats closer together,' Drejes said. 'It was more
tactical than a navigator's race. The intensity was relentless. When we had
15 sleds [in past years] you were lucky to see another boat.' The
difference was that there was less chance to break away from a rival
between roll calls, as Roy E. Disney's Pyewacket did against Zephyrus in
1999.

Disney said, 'We were within sight of each other for seven
consecutive days.

Drejes said, 'I suppose somebody could have missed a roll call, but we felt
that wasn't in the spirit of the competition.' Drejes, who won the Don
Vaughan top crew member award sailing with Disney in '99, played a key role
in organizing Kahn's crew. 'Philippe hired a band of mercenaries from
around the world,' Drejes said. . . .



Standings in order of handicap ratings at 8:30 a.m. PDT July 12:

DIVISION 1 (started July 1)

1. Pegasus (Reichel/Pugh 75), Philippe Kahn, Santa Cruz, Calif., finished 8
days 2 hours 34 minutes 3 seconds.
2. Pyewacket (Reichel/Pugh 73), Roy E. Disney, Los Angeles, Calif.,
8:03:36:58.
3. Chance (Reichel/Pugh 74), Bob McNulty, Corona del Mar, Calif.,
8:05:08:24.
4. Merlin's Reata (Lee 68), Al Micallef, Ft. Worth, Tex., 8:17:45:35.

DIVISION 2 (started July 1)

1. Grand Illusion (Santa Cruz 70), James McDowell, Haiku, H.I.,
9:02:34:24.
2. J-Bird III (Transpac 52), David Janes, Newport Beach, Calif.,
8:23:36:10.
3. Taxi Dancer (R/P 68), Brian W. Mock, Corona del Mar, Calif., 9:04:17:13.
4. Yassou (Transpac 52), Jim and Nancy Demetriades, Beverly Hills, Calif.,
9:05:50:42.
5. Medicine Man (Andrews 61), Bob Lane, Long Beach, Calif., 9:02:47:43.
6. Ragtime (Spencer 65), Hui Holokai Syndicate, Owen Minney/Trisha Steele,
Honolulu, 9:17:20:25.
7. Mongoose (SC 70), Robert Saielli, La Jolla, Calif., 9:16:18:32.
8. DH--Étranger (Jutson 50), Howard Gordon, San Luis Obispo, Calif.,
10:04:04:01.

DIVISION 3 (started June 30)

1. Cantata (Andrews 53), Brent Vaughan, Oceanside, Calif., 10:07:44:54.
2. Firebird (Nelson/Marek 55), Greg Sands, Long Beach, Calif., 10:08:16:10.
3. Bengal II (Ohashi 52), Yoshihiko Murase, Nagoya, Japan, 9:16:20:56.
4. Baronesa V (Open 40), Shuichi Ogasawara, Miyagi, Japan, 10:00:49:34.
5. Rocket Science (Riptide 55), Nguyen Le, Amsterdam, 10:01:26:49.

DIVISION 4 (started June 30)

1. Bull (Sydney 40 OD-T), Seth Radow, Marina del Rey, Calif., 10:17:49:19.
2. Sensation (1D35), Mike Thomas, Detroit, Mich., 11:01:07:05.
3. DH--Two Guys On the Edge (Sonoma 30), Dan Doyle, Honolulu, H.I., 181
miles last 24 hours/215 miles to go.
4. Ouch (J/120), Ted Mayes, San Juan Capistrano, Calif., 11:13:35:47.
5. Uproarious (Olson 40), Robert Bussard, Santa Fe, N.M., 11:22:07:58.
6. Mystere (Swan 42), Jorge Morales, Laguna Niguel, Calif., 155/355.
7. DH --Watercolors (Sabre 402), Michael Abraham, Newport Beach, Calif.,
151/352.
RETIRED -- LawnDart (Fast 40), Bill Allan, Nanaimo, B.C., 2,175.

DH-Doublehanded

ALOHA DIVISION A (started June 25)

1. Willow Wind (Cal 40), Wendy Siegal, Sunset Beach, Calif., 14:05:01:24.
2. Shanakee II (Pedrick 75), Jim Warmington, Balboa, 11:15:51:38.
3. Seda (Ericson 41), Josef Sedivec, Bonita, Calif., 15:11:48:05.
4. Sea Dancer (Ericson 35), Al Wheatman, Marina del Rey, 16:03:44:57.
5. Bonaire (Moody 65), Gil Jones and Associates, Newport Beach,
13:22:53:56.
6. Gecko (Tartan 41), Jim Fabrick, Laguna Beach, 15:15:09:09.

ALOHA DIVISION B (started June 25)

1. Axapac (Wylie 39), Barry Ruff, Vancouver, B.C., 3:23:55:26.
2. Stardust (Wylie 46), Peter and Patricia Anderson, Laguna Beach,
13:05:01:24.
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