Joe Harris Marblehead to Halifax Race and summer updates
by Joe Harris, GryphonSolo2 19 Jul 2023 07:52 AEST
I am just back from the 2023 Marblehead to Halifax Race so thought I would send a quick update of the race, as well as an overall update on life after the Globe40.
Roger Junet and I finished the Globe40 in March in Lorient, France and I sold GS2 soon after the finish. It was indeed a sad day after 12 years of owning the boat and racing her twice around the world, but it was finally time to move on. I returned home to Hamilton, MA and have been focused mainly on my family and appreciating being back on terra firma. However, when my old college friend Jim Alden asked me to sail in the Marblehead to Halifax race aboard his X-Yachts 55 "Frejya", it didn't take long to say "yes!"
This boat is seriously big and comfortable and was a welcome change to the camping conditions aboard GS2. However, the boat had never been raced before, so there was a bit of a scramble to get her ready down at New England Boatworks in Portsmouth, RI. We sailed Frejya from NEB to Marblehead and the race started on Sunday afternoon July 9 in light air and foggy conditions. We had a crew of 7: Owner Jim Alden, previous owner Bill Jacobsen, Boat captain Brendon Scanlon, Australian Peter Fletcher, Bill Gause, my old pal Roger Junet and myself as Naviguessor.
While we had not spent much time on the boat, we got a good start and headed NE with our new friends in ORR Class 2. Light headwinds and fog was the theme for the next three days and the boat performed very well given the challenging conditions. As we approached Halifax, the wind went behind us into the South and the West, so we had quite a bit of time in the new Code Zero sail that Jim had recently purchased. However, in the middle of the night the halyard holding up the sail broke and the sail went in the water, and required an "All hands on deck" effort to pull it back onboard before it was swept away.
We finally finished the 365-mile race in about 3 days and sailed into Halifax downwind and in bright sunshine. Freyja took 5th place of 8 boats in ORR Class 2, a fine showing for her first race. The shoreside celebration was excellent as always, as Jim and I had a lot of practice both in college at Brown and in the early days of sailing my C&C 40 and Aerodyne 38 together to Bermuda, Halifax and other races and it was fun to be re-united and racing and celebrating together again.
I hope everyone is enjoying a great summer. Drop me a line if you come to Block Island.