What happened at the Long Beach to Catalina race?
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KiloKat
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Re: What happened at the Long Beach to Catalina race?
From the pics that I saw on the AMF blog post, it looked like fog set in. I'm sure someone will comment soon with specifics.
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Re: What happened at the Long Beach to Catalina race?
Originally Posted by BODYSHOT1
Kilo...I think the fog pics are from Point Pleasant....I just hit the blog quickly, so I could be wrong....
#5
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Re: What happened at the Long Beach to Catalina race?
Unbelievable run . Guys WE HAVE TO BRING BACK OCEAN RACING!!!!
Trying to keep a boat on course at 110 in 4-6 ft rollers (even with the latest raymarine) was a challenge. Open ocean water changes so many different times throughout a race from flat on the inside to rough at a breakwater to big roller's on a sponson ...to 1-2 ft on the bow...you get the picture. You really had to work as a team. LOTS of fun. Even though I didn't want to admit it (that it was different than closed course). Ocean racing is the soul of the sport we love. I hope you guys get a chance to experience it in a run like the Catilina Rum Run.
We had a good start running up to 135 behind the breakwater, turned out of Queens Gate and got our first taste of the Pacific. Needless to say we backed of to a nice pace of about a hundred to the first and second bouys. On the run back we ran out of water for injection (we use it to clean the turbine blades from salt spray). So we called it a day and cruised in at 20 mph.
All and all a fantastic AMF weekend. Great group of racers out West
GOOD SEAT TIME.
Boats are on their way to Toronto as we speak.
Marc
Trying to keep a boat on course at 110 in 4-6 ft rollers (even with the latest raymarine) was a challenge. Open ocean water changes so many different times throughout a race from flat on the inside to rough at a breakwater to big roller's on a sponson ...to 1-2 ft on the bow...you get the picture. You really had to work as a team. LOTS of fun. Even though I didn't want to admit it (that it was different than closed course). Ocean racing is the soul of the sport we love. I hope you guys get a chance to experience it in a run like the Catilina Rum Run.
We had a good start running up to 135 behind the breakwater, turned out of Queens Gate and got our first taste of the Pacific. Needless to say we backed of to a nice pace of about a hundred to the first and second bouys. On the run back we ran out of water for injection (we use it to clean the turbine blades from salt spray). So we called it a day and cruised in at 20 mph.
All and all a fantastic AMF weekend. Great group of racers out West
GOOD SEAT TIME.
Boats are on their way to Toronto as we speak.
Marc
Last edited by Maximus; 07-10-2006 at 08:28 PM.
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Re: What happened at the Long Beach to Catalina race?
Originally Posted by Maximus
Unbelievable run . Guys WE HAVE TO BRING BACK OCEAN RACING!!!!.Even though I didn't want to admit it. Ocean racing is the soul of the sport we love. I hope you guys get a chance to experience it.
Marc
Marc
Marc everyone has experienced ocean racing, OPA, APBA/SBI and OSS. Why would`nt you want to admit it is the question? every sanctioning body has Offshore written all over it. BTW, I know Scotty loves Offshore racing in that mig or in his Pantera.
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Re: What happened at the Long Beach to Catalina race?
Originally Posted by ALBERT
Marc everyone has experienced ocean racing, OPA, APBA/SBI and OSS. Why would`nt you want to admit it is the question? every sanctioning body has Offshore written all over it. BTW, I know Scotty loves Offshore racing in that mig or in his Pantera.
I just got to experience something that guys like Billy Martin ,Top Bannana , Aronow, Nordscog built the sport on. And I wanted to share my excitment. And for the record it would have been a challenge no matter what you were piloting. There was even a group of Jet Ski's that made the run.
The Still got it guys ,Scotty and myself really had a LOT of fun.
Marc
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Re: What happened at the Long Beach to Catalina race?
Up until Sunday I had only done closed coarse racing, and this was very different. I know that conditions change every lap, but there is still some similarity to the water you are running in. Running 26+ miles in the same direction brought on different types of water that was very unexpected. You really never knew what was coming next.
While one would say that it would be easy running between a few points (set the GPS and go), more than one boat got confused on the run and ended up a little off coarse which would cause a big deviation on finding the turn. Even coming back into the harbour was tough, we ended up in the spectator fleet (bummer).
The other variable was breakage and the potential of wrecking. I promise you that you will think way more about these two issues when you are out in the middle of the ocean as opposed to a close coarse. Bottom line is even though there were many helicopers and safety boats, you were truly on your own. They could only see you so well and there were many many time we were running so alone had something happened we would have been out there for god knows how long before we got assistance.
While every boat came home, multiple boats had to stop to fix problems, which you had to do as the tow back would have taken up to 6 hours.
If the race did nothing else it changed my respect for our fore-fathers. These guys were water warriors, what they went through and endured to race took a commitment light years beyond what we have to commit today. There is no doubt that some of you would race if all the races were like these, but I do believe, many of you would not.
This was not a race for spectators, it was for racers.
By the way, if Bob Teague is listening, let's keep this at 75 miles, the 200+ mile race you spoke of did not even sound fun.
Thank you to all the AMF and POPRA guys for putting on this race. I feel a little more like a racer today for having competed in the event.
Rick
While one would say that it would be easy running between a few points (set the GPS and go), more than one boat got confused on the run and ended up a little off coarse which would cause a big deviation on finding the turn. Even coming back into the harbour was tough, we ended up in the spectator fleet (bummer).
The other variable was breakage and the potential of wrecking. I promise you that you will think way more about these two issues when you are out in the middle of the ocean as opposed to a close coarse. Bottom line is even though there were many helicopers and safety boats, you were truly on your own. They could only see you so well and there were many many time we were running so alone had something happened we would have been out there for god knows how long before we got assistance.
While every boat came home, multiple boats had to stop to fix problems, which you had to do as the tow back would have taken up to 6 hours.
If the race did nothing else it changed my respect for our fore-fathers. These guys were water warriors, what they went through and endured to race took a commitment light years beyond what we have to commit today. There is no doubt that some of you would race if all the races were like these, but I do believe, many of you would not.
This was not a race for spectators, it was for racers.
By the way, if Bob Teague is listening, let's keep this at 75 miles, the 200+ mile race you spoke of did not even sound fun.
Thank you to all the AMF and POPRA guys for putting on this race. I feel a little more like a racer today for having competed in the event.
Rick
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Re: What happened at the Long Beach to Catalina race?
Anyone who has raced knows that the prize at the end is really the knowledge that you did your very best.
Open ocean racing brings that out of you in a way that is magnified. Only you and your crew know if you ran as fast as you could and didn't throttle back.
When there is nothing but open ocean for 360 degrees, it takes a firm mindset to keep going and believe in your navigator....GPS? What was that?
Look at this photo of Betty and the horizon that just keeps going.
I know we old guys sound like sour grapes some time, but we really hope that the next generation of racers could experience racing open ocean courses. If you try it you'll love it.
As far as a 200 mile race being fun, that was pretty much a standard course for open boats......but, think of the Bahamas 500 and how the race would last 12 hours or more.
Join our organization, it is free, all you need is to have is an interest in the history of the sport.
www.historicraceboats.com
Open ocean racing brings that out of you in a way that is magnified. Only you and your crew know if you ran as fast as you could and didn't throttle back.
When there is nothing but open ocean for 360 degrees, it takes a firm mindset to keep going and believe in your navigator....GPS? What was that?
Look at this photo of Betty and the horizon that just keeps going.
I know we old guys sound like sour grapes some time, but we really hope that the next generation of racers could experience racing open ocean courses. If you try it you'll love it.
As far as a 200 mile race being fun, that was pretty much a standard course for open boats......but, think of the Bahamas 500 and how the race would last 12 hours or more.
Join our organization, it is free, all you need is to have is an interest in the history of the sport.
www.historicraceboats.com