Bermuda Race - Lighthouse winners determined

by Lynn Fitzpatrick on 26 Jun 2008
Sinn Fein, Peter Rebovich’s Cal 40 from Metuchen New Jersey, beat the other ten boats in Class 1 and the entire 123-boat St. David’s Lighthouse Division for top honors in the 2008 Newport Bermuda Race. This is Rebovich’s fourth successive Class 1 win and his second lighthouse win in a row.

In addition to claiming the St. David’s Lighthouse Division victory, Sinn Fein is the first boat ever to win the North Rock Beacon Trophy, which was donated this year by the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club for the winner on corrected time among all of the 122 IRC-rated boats in the combined St. David’s and the Gibbs Hill Lighthouse Divisions.

Sinn Fein, pronounced 'Sin Fin' by the renegades from Raritan Yacht Club, placed first in Class 1, the small boat group, in the 2002, 2004 and 2006 Newport Bermuda Races. The crew has been together for several Bermuda Races with five of the seven members having been on the 2002 team and all of them having been aboard for the Centennial Newport Bermuda Race in 2006, so all of them have now won Class 1 and St. David’s Lighthouse trophies.

The small boats had a very different race from that sailed by the big boats in the Open Division that finished the day before them. The winds were on the bow, straight from Bermuda the entire time, and were much stronger after the High that buffered the approach to Bermuda earlier in the week, had disappeared.

Peter Rebovich said of his crew, 'This is the best crew in the race without a doubt and this was one of the most difficult races, because it was all upwind. No one got sick, but we did have mechanical issues. It was an unexpected win because we lost our electronics when we swamped the computer and lost use of our satellite phone. We could navigate, but we couldn’t communicate. It was a total surprise!'

Sinn Fein is no stranger to celebrating in Bermuda. The crew was unanimous in saying that they were going to drink a lot, go to the Governor’s party and eat Bermuda out of fish chowder.

Sinn Fein’s elapsed time or 104:43:57 corrected at 61:06:38 under ORR and 100:13:44 under the IRC rule. Selkie, a McCurdy Rhodes 38, skippered by Sheila McCurdy, Vice Commodore of the Cruising Club of America, was second with a corrected time of 62:10:18. Emily, Edwin S. Gaynor’s Nielsen 44, was third in the division with a corrected time of 63:23:48.

Sinn Fein’s all amateur crew is comprised of Peter S. Rebovich Sr., Gary Gochal, Henry Henning, Peter S. Rebovich Jr., Mark P. Rebovich, Kelly Robinson and Foster Tallman.

Tenacious, the little Beneteau First 36.7 sailed by Julian Dougherty of City Island New York, was smallest boat in the Gibbs Hill Division of traditional keelboats with professional crews and won against the likes of the R/P 90 Rambler, STP65 Moneypenny. and the new R/P 69 Bella Mente. Rambler crossed the line first on Monday afternoon and Tenacious completed her voyage down to Bermuda on Tuesday night.

Tenacious had a total elapsed time of 103:00:28 which corrected out to 56:53:20. She finished two and a half hours ahead of Thomas Carroll’s J 133 Sirensong, the second place boat in Class 10 of the Gibbs Hill Lighthouse Division. Aquarius, Sam Fleet’s Swan 601, won Class 11, the other Gibbs Hill Lighthouse Division. The corrected time for Aquarius was 63:04:10.

Tenacious was largely sailed by amateurs from Long Island Sound. Her crew included: Stephen Cain, Julien Dougherty, Gerard Girsti, Thomas Mikolasko, Heather Schultes and Jeffrey Tyrel. Sailmaker Adam Lorry, was the sole professional on board and the team entered the Gibbs Hill Lighthouse division to allow him to drive the boat.

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