A Last Blast and the Block Party is Over

by Barby MacGowan on 23 Jun 2007 The wind rallied again for the final day of the Storm Trysail Club's Block Island Race Week XXII presented by Rolex, blowing early and hard at 18-22 knots with gusts up to 25. It was a final chance for the 2000 sailors on 183 boats to better their scores from five racing days, but in the end, leads from yesterday changed in only one of the 18 classes sailing.

That class was for PHRF Navigator Non Spinnaker, which headed off on its usual course around government marks while 17 other classes--sailing in PHRF, IRC and One-Design--competed in round-the-buoys racing on windward/leeward courses. All week it had been tit-for-tat between Paul Pakos' Swan 44 Xenophon (Sudbury, Mass.), sailed mostly by a group of Coast Guard alumni who have been coming to Block Island for 20 years, and Kel Weber's (Wilton, Conn.) J/34C Rascal, which won today's race to take class honors by a single point. Weber is familiar around these docks; he has been coming to Race Week for 18 years and has won his class five times.

'I'm flabbergasted,' said Weber upon learning that Xenophon finished fifth in today's race. 'They were leading us around the course all week long. We did, however, have the right sail combination for today's wind, and they might have used too much sail and had a more difficult time.'

In many ways, Weber is typical of those who come back time and again in uneven years to compete at Block Island Race Week, which first made its mark on this tiny land mass in 1965. But in other ways he simply best represents the revered old guard, and there are plenty of young people and innovative new boats that constitute the vibrant new guard.

Case in point is Blue Yankee, Bob and son Farley Towse's (Stamford, Conn.) Reichel/Pugh 66 sailing in the six-boat Super Zero class for IRC, the hottest, newest rating rule being used in the U.S. After finishing second in today's race and posting four victories and a second prior to that, Blue Yankee and its crew of notables, including skipper Steve Benjamin, tactician Edward Warden Owen and strategist Chris Larson, also won the inaugural Rolex US-IRC National Championship. The mathematical formula for determining Blue Yankee as champion was based on fleet performance, using corrected boat speed, and class competitiveness.

'Obviously there were some big gaps between us and the rest of the class,' said Farley Towse, referring to the pace of Blue Yankee, which at times put it a leg ahead of the others. 'But that being said, it doesn't matter how far ahead or behind you are because anything can happen, and with one of the variables for the national championship being a comparison between classes, you're always sailing against time.' With Blue Yankee having been purpose built for IRC racing, it matched up fairly in the national championship determination against others of the same ilk, such as Colm Barrington's (Dublin, Ireland) Ker 50 Magic Glove (winner of IRC Zero class), as well as older boats, such as Randall and Matt Baldwin's (Ridgefield, Conn.) Taylor 42 Cabady, which won today's race and topped 14 boats in its IRC class 5.

Going into today, Cabady was nipping at the heels of Blue Yankee for the national championship, but it was Hunt Lawrence's (New York, N.Y.) Ker 11.3 Cracker in the 10-boat IRC class that rose to second in the national championship ranking, with Cabady slipping to third. Cabady, however, won the perpetual US-IRC Trophy for the best overall IRC performance at the regatta, as judged by the race committee.

'Our performance shows that a good older boat can come into IRC and compete with the custom-built IRC boats,' said Matt Baldwin, explaining that Cabady, the old Numbers, was built in 1991. 'It shows that the IRC rating is fair.'

Overall winner of PHRF racing, also determined by the race committee, was John Storck's (Huntington, N.Y.) J/80 Rumor, skippered by his college All-American daughter Kaity, while Stephen Tedeschi's Tastes Like Chicken (St. Petersburg, Fla.) took overall honors in One-Design racing, sailing in the 19-boat J/109 class. The skippers of Rumor and Tastes Like Chicken each received a Rolex Oyster Perpetual Submariner timepiece, while Blue Yankee received a Rolex steel and platinum Yacht-Master as the winner of the Rolex US-IRC National Championship.

Other Trophy Winners

Everett B. Morris Memorial Trophy for Best Overall Performance: Magic Glove

Isbrandtsen Overall Perpetual Trophy for the second best performance: Cracker

A. Justin Wasley Memorial Trophy for the overall winner of the one-design class with the largest number of entries: Savasana

Island Sailing Club of Cowes Perpetual Trophy for the first overall IRC rated boat in the Around the Island Race (also won a Rolex oyster Perpetual Submariner timepiece): Blue Yankee

Vintage Yacht Trophy for the yacht 15 years or older with the best performance of the week: Cabady

John Alden Reed Perpetual Trophy for the best performance by a Service Academy Yacht: Tomcat, USNA

Governors Perpetual Trophy for the foreign yacht with the best performance of the week: Magic Glove

Shelter Island Team Trophy: 1. Storm Trysail Club Red (Rumor, Lora Ann, Challenge V); 2. New York Yacht Club (Arethusa, Troubador, Blue Yankee); 3. Cedar Point Yacht Club (Rascal, Storm, One Up)

Today was UK Halsey Race Day, while Hall Spars and Gowrie, Barden & Brett sponsored the official party under the event tent.

Compliments of Rolex, daily video shows of each day's racing, produced by Annapolis-based T2Productions, will be shown and broadcast on-line each night by 9 p.m. on www.t2p.tv. Race Week sponsors are Rolex, Jeep, Mt. Gay, Caithness Energy, Vineyard Vines, Lewmar, B&G, Gill, Hall Spars, J Boats, the Rhode Island State Yachting Committee, Sailing World, UKHalsey Sailmakers, West Marine, Gowrie, Barden & Brett, Summit Performance Yachts, WindCheck Magazine, Sailing World, Heineken and Yellow Tail wine.

Race administration and scoring is by Yacht Scoring (www.yachtscoring.com. For more information, visit www.blockislandraceweek.com