Oh wait, that was some other year.
This year, the various Hospice Regatta fleets faced a different challenge — racing Friday and Saturday in winds that rarely rose above zephyr level in Southwest Harbor and on the Great Harbor south of Mount Desert Island.
Despite the shortage of wind that turned much of the racing, particularly on Saturday, into barely more than a drifting match, there was no shortage of participation in the event that is a major fund-raiser for Hospice Volunteers of Hancock County.
“The event was a success in terms of participation and sponsorship, awareness-raising and feedback from participants and the community,” Jody Wolford-Tucker, the organization’s executive director, said in an e-mail Monday.
Saturday featured two groups of races, one for cruising boats the other for International One-Design (IOD) sloops. Both fleets struggled with wind that couldn’t make up its mind whether it was a sea breeze or a land breeze and sometimes seemed to give up the effort to reach a decision.
Six boats came to the line for a 1:10 p.m. start in the cruising race. With a west southwest breeze, the fleet set off on an 11.8-mile course that had it beating down the Western Way, rounding the Long Ledge gong buoy and tiding up the Western Way again before heading east for the Spurling Rock bell between Sutton Island and Islesford, then back to a finish off the Manset shore by way of the bell off Bear Island outside Northeast Harbor.
It was a slow race.
Hal Kroger’s Far Out covered the course in just under 2 hours 29 minutes and took overall honors with a corrected time of just over 2 hours 15 minutes. It was the second win in a row for the Morris 52 with the owl on its spinnaker.
Scratch boat in the fleet, Far Out took advantage of its tall mast, generous sail plan and the displacement that helped it push through the first of the flood tide in the Western Way that seemed to stop lighter boats such as Tom Rolfes’ J/105 Sidewinder and Mike Cook’s J/100 Flirt in their tracks.
Sidewinder actually led the fleet early on the beat but, as the ebb died, seemed almost pinned to the shore of Pebble Cove on Great Cranberry Island and finished the race almost 35 minutes behind the winner — a full half-hour on corrected time.
Written by Stephen Rappaport
Read more — Learn more
Hospice of Hancock County website
Hospice Regatta of Maine page
National Hospice Regattas Alliance website
National Hospice Regatta Alliance blog
National Hospice Regatta Alliance facebook page
