US Optimist National Championship Regattas - Winner is decided

by Rich Roberts on 27 Jul 2009
As expected, Axel Sly held onto his commanding lead Sunday to win the US Optimist National Championships hosted by the Cabrillo Beach Yacht Club, but Christopher Williford, the defending champion, made him earn it in tough conditions against strong competition.

Even after Sly, 15, of Weston, Fla., won the first of three races on the final day---his sixth win in the last seven---to all but clinch the glory, Williford, 14, from Ft. Lauderdale, still had some fight left.

About 10 seconds after the start of the next race, Williford noted, 'I made him do a 720 [degree double] penalty turn. We were luffing and I moved up [from the leeward position with the right of way] and hit him.'

Sly conceded later that Williford had caught him off guard.

'Yes, just before that happened he was far enough away that I didn't think he was going to do anything.'

Then, in the rush hour traffic of an 80-boat start, Sly had to work for room to do his double turns, 'and it was so soon after the start that everybody was passing me.'

Williford finished sixth as Sly recovered to finish eighth, clinching first place without having to sail a third race, even if there would be enough time before the 2:30 cutoff time . . . which there was . . . which Williford won, with Sly second.

Williford said at that point, with the final outcome determined, 'We were both just sailing our own races.'

Sly's plan: 'Just get a good start and go fast.'

A re-interpretation overnight of the Sailing Instructions erased the application of throwouts after Race 11, which was the first race Sunday. Race 6 remained the only discard, which Williford used to erase his early start (OCS) that wiped out one of this three first places Saturday. In the final placings, it wouldn't have made a difference.

Sly's winning string of finishes was 3-4-2-2-1-1-(9)-1-1-1-1-8-2 for 27 points. Williford's tally was 42, followed by Wade Waddell, 13, of Palm Beach, Fla. with 69---a Sunshine State sweep of the top three places.

There was a moment in the first race when Christopher's twin brother Duncan slipped into the lead group, making it a threesome and raising the notion of the Williford's ganging up on Sly with some team racing tactics.

Christopher responded to the suggestion with a 'no'---but smiled at the idea.

They'll pick up their rivalry in the Optimist Worlds in Brazil later this week---Williford's first and Sly's third, although the latter's best advantage may be the Southern Hemisphere proximity to his Argentine homeland.

It also will be Sly's last Worlds. He ages out of the class after this year, and he hasn't decided what kind of boat he'll try next.

'My first two Worlds were not too good,' Sly said. 'But I've sailed there before so I know the place. It's going to be light but with no waves.'

In other words, the flip side of Hurricane Gulch, where the winds and waves increasingly flexed their muscles through the week-long series of Team Racing, Girls and open National Championships. The breeze Sunday was 9 knots at the start and had touched 15 before racing ended at about 3 o'clock. Waves were 4 to 5 feet as the 7-foot, 9-inch long boats alternately disappeared in the troughs and surfed off the crests.

'Wow,' many of the faces of the boys and girls ages 7 to 15 appeared to be declare, 'This is fun!'

For the first three days the two equal fleets were scored as one, but Sunday the top 80 boats were reassigned to the Gold-Silver group to sail for the top prizes. The 41st-place boat---Roman Screve, 11, of San Francisco---was awarded the Silver title.

All the others competed in the Bronze-Pearl group, won by Nic Baird, 12, of St. Petersburg, Fla. His dad is Ed Baird, who drove the Alinghi boat to an America's Cup victory in 2007.

Kohl Killeen, 14, of New Orleans, was forced out of competition Saturday by a burst appendix. He was reported to be recovering satisfactorily in a local hospital.

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