Thanks to Peter Lissett and Sonia Telford for the 2011 to 2017 notes. Thanks to Alex Anglin for the 2018 notes.
2011 RACE #43, APRIL 22-25
Well, there was no chance of too much wind this year! I was serving on the start line at the pin end with George Streadwick in CHAPERONE. We had no difficulty setting the hook in the right place and had a great view of all the fleet puttering about before the start. We could also hear Len Kelsey on Dundarave Pier explaining what was happening to a pretty large crowd. What fine job he does every year. I gather the whole on-shore enterprise was very successful again this year with the added invitation for interested people to come out to the club for lunch. I hadn’t realized this was happening, so was surprised by the splendid lunch on offer when we got back. There were lots of people enjoying it too.
The new requirement for the fleet this year was that each vessel carry a transponder. This allowed us to watch the progress of each boat throughout the race on the internet. There was a big screen TV setup by the fireplace in the clubhouse where you could watch it while sipping a small libation, otherwise you could do the same at home. The display showed the position of each yacht, her direction and speed over the bottom. I felt for them out there in the small hours of the morning trying to coax some speed out their boats with next to no wind to work with.
Most years, the Short Course fleet starts crossing the line at a little after midnight, that is, very early on Saturday morning. This year Clint Currie’s INCISOR was first to finish at twenty to eight. Sean Hulscher’s MELTEMI, the winner on corrected time, at a minute or so past eight.
James Duess in M POWER, was the highest placed WVYC boat on the Medium Course taking 35 hours to finish. He placed first in Division 3. There were no WVYC boats in the Long Course. ICON placed first on corrected time. She took almost 36 hours. Last place finisher on the Long Course, RAVEN from TCYC, took 47 hours! Now that’s what I call perseverance!
2012 RACE #44, APRIL 6-8
This was the 44th running of our Southern Straits Classic. The weather forecast had predicted “high pressure ridge” with little, if any, wind…lots of sun though! It turned out that there was just enough pressure for the 55 boat fleet to get away under spinnaker off Dundarave Pier at the start.
The wind became extremely light by the time the racers got to Pt. Atkinson. Conditions stayed that way until sunrise on Saturday when the wind filled in resulting in a great spinnaker ride to the finish line in the afternoon. Members were able to watch the progress of the whole event on their computers thanks to a GPS tracker on each boat.
Congratulations to the overall winners: Sandy Huntingford in FARRARI on the Medium Course, and Sean Hulscher in POUDRE d’OR on the Short Course - a great tribute to his father Buddy.
Line honours went to Clint Currie, INCISOR, on the Short Course and Peter McCarthy, THE SHADOW, on the Medium Course. There were no WVYC boats competing on the Long Course.
2013 RACE #45, MARCH 29-31
SUNNY SKIES AS WELL AS WARM WEATHER AND A SPECTACULAR SHOWING OF THE NORTHERN LIGHTS HIGHLIGHTED THE 45TH SOUTHERN STRAITS RACE.
The Race featured the three Classic Straits Courses and an Inshore Route for boats and crews not quite ready for the more demanding courses. As a Vic-Maui qualifying race, Southern Straits attracted 76 boats to compete.
On the Long Course, Peter Salusbury; in his new Riptide 35, Longboard, was first in Division Two and first overall.
In the two Medium Courses Sandy Huntingford in Farr-Ari become first in Division Three with James Duess in M Power; fifth. Patrick Firsch; Papillon, sixth and Peter McCarthy; The Shadow, eighth with Line Honours. Division Four had Chris Ladd in Fortisssimo fighting the light airs for tenth place. In Division Five, Brian Kyle in Séance secured ninth place.
On the Short Course, Cam Telford and his crew on Aeolus took Line Honours in Division Six and held it for first place. Sean Hulscher, Meltemi, followed in fourth. Frank Fletcher; Voila, fifth. Division Seven saw Race Chair Ty Abrams in Ed finish in second place followed by Edward Karadontis in Dusty Mauch, fourth. Declan Sacre in Ragusa overcame challenges to finish ninth and Hank Schut in Tarka was tenth.
The new Inshore Course saw the Club’s Melges 23S take four of the top five spots. R Boat; Ron Mulder first, Honey Badger; Michael Bond, second, Aquaholics; Graeme Clendenan, third and Sawlty Trousers/Team CBC; Matt Wagstaffe in fifth place.
Much credit must go to Ty Abrams and his hard working volunteers for making this International Event such a success.
2014 RACE #46, APRIL 18-20
Straits 2014 boasted one of the largest turnouts since the '80's with 96 boats on the Long, Medium, Short and Inshore courses. The medium course was the most popular with 40 entries and a strong US contingent was seen on the Start Line. For once, the weather co-operated and the gale warning that Environment Canada issued for the top end of the course never materialized. The strongest wind was 20+ knots coming out of Howe Sound on Saturday morning, sending the Fleet quickly across the Finish Line at Pt. Atkinson.
On the Long Course, Neptune's Car skippered by Paul LaMarche was first overall. Midsummer (Kodiak) skippered by Ty Abrams took Line Honours and was first overall on the Medium Course and Frank Fletcher on Viola was the overall Short Course winner. On the Inshore, Harry Coleman on Ocean Pearl was first overall.
Congratulations to Chair Ty Abrams and all members of the Race Committee for a great event.
2015 RACE #47, APRIL 3-5
Straits 2015 matched 2014 numbers exactly with 96 boats on the Start Line, 12 of these being first time Straits Skipper's. Heavy skies threatened rain at the Start Line, but the drops held off until the Fleet were on their way. A larger than normal crowd gathered at Dundarave Pier and they were treated to a spectacular downwind spinnaker start, with the added bonus of seeing Eric Holden and the Open 60 "O Canada" head off on her maiden voyage under Canada Ocean Racing.
Reports from the Race Course call Straits 2015 in many ways the "perfect" race: good breeze throughout the duration, the forecasted rain never developed past the odd shower, a Blood Red Lunar Eclipse with a "moonbow" overnight and not only was there wind at the Finish Line, a pod of dolphins were on hand at Pt Atkinson to welcome the Fleet home.
On the Long Course, WVYC's Peter Salusbury and his Riptide 35-2 Longboard was the overall First place podium finish, with Alex Simanis taking First on the Medium Course on Poke & Destroy his Evelyn 32-2 from Sloop Tavern YC. Incisor, a CY8.0 from WVYC, took First place for the Short Course under new ownership with William & Kerry Phillips. Michael Bond from RVic placed First on the Inshore Course with his Melges 24 Recidivist.
Congratulations to Chair Sonia Telford and her team of 96 Volunteers for a great Easter weekend of racing.
2016 RACE #48, MARCH 25-27
Easter fell early in 2016 with a late March race date that provided an additional challenge of shorter daylight hours and the potential need for additional clothing layers overnight. 108 Volunteers organized and hosted this year’s event and a new social media campaign was rolled out featuring individual Boat Bios and live race updates that proved to be hugely popular.
Race day dawned with sunny skies and a large crowd gathered on the Dundarave Pier alongside the Easter Bunny to watch the downwind spinnaker start. An audible “ahhh” could be clearly heard across the water as HMCS ORIOLE hoisted her chute, making her debut on the Southern Straits race course to celebrate her 96th birthday. While the sunny & clear skies prevailed throughout the race, unfortunately the wind did not resulting in a large percentage of the Fleet to retire. For those who were able to cross the Finish Line, the podium was full:
Congratulations to Paul LaMarche’s Neptune’s Car, correcting to 1st place for the Long Course by just over 2 minutes, with Valkyrie closing in quickly to capture a 2nd place result. 3rd on the Long Course was WVYC’s Peter Salusbury on Longboard. An error by Race Committee at the Start Line meant that the Medium Course was unable to be scored overall.
Congratulations to Time Bandit for placing 1st in Div 4; Diva for placing 1st in Div 5; Balderdash for placing 1st in Div 6 and WVYC’s Kodiak for placing 1st in Div 7. On the Short Course, Graham Heath’s Pitoraq for won overall for the Short Course, followed by WVYC’s Incisor placing 2nd and Ed placing 3rd.
The Inshore Course enjoyed a fantastic day of racing, closely followed by a lone Grey Whale that swam with the Fleet along the Spanish Bank shore. WVYC was well represented on the podium with Sawlty Trowsers in 1st place finish, followed closely by Ferdinand in 2nd and Meltemi in 3rd.
2017 RACE #49, APRIL 14-16
As the Southern Straits Race approached its 49th anniversary, the Organizing Crew hit the road with a new pre-race Tech Talk series that toured VRC, RVYC and Nanaimo YC. As the countdown clock ticked to the race start, excitement grew as our social media presence soared and everyone had fingers crossed that Mother Nature would provide a little more breeze than 2016! 2017 also saw the implementation of the “bigger & better” pre-race Safety checks with SPOT Trackers and Skipper Kits being delivered right to the boat.
On race day, the Straits Race Committee were treated to the ultimate Start Line experience aboard Mark & Cathy Sagar’s beautiful 96ft MV ORIANA who served as our official Start Boat. Spectators and competitors enjoyed another spectacular downwind spinnaker start and Mother Nature was most definitely on our side as racers surfed up the Strait, the majority of the Fleet rounding their first mark during daylight hours, including the Medium & Long Course boats rounding Sisters.
The trip back to the Finish Line proved to be a little more challenging as strong currents and light winds resulted in tricky tactical decisions having to be made. Overnight racing was held with the Fleet in close quarters and the Finish Line Committee was kept busy right up to the final minutes of the race.
The TP52’s battled it out on the Long Course with Kinetic V crossing the line less than 3 minutes ahead of Smoke. Westerly joined them on the podium, placing 3rd on the Long Course.
On the Medium Course, Beats per Minute celebrated a 1st place victory, with Diva placing 2nd and DILLIGAF finished in 3rd with a solid Double-Handed race.
On the Short Course, Incisor took 1st place, with Meltemi in 2nd and Hurricane placing 3rd. The Inshore Course podium saw a Melges 24 sweep with Ferdinand placing 1st, Ocean Pearl in 2nd and Cool Beans finishing 3rd.
As the race drew to a close, Southern Straits 2017 marked the retirement of PRO JC Dale and Race Chair Sonia Telford. Both would like to express their thanks to the hard-working team of Volunteers that make Straits such a memorable event for all those involved.
2018 RACE #50, MARCH 30 - APRIL 1
By Alex Anglin, Committee Chair for Promotions and Finish Line
The 50th Annual Southern Straits Classic Yacht Race on Easter weekend was resounding success. The start line of all four courses was held off Dundarave Pier in West Vancouver and the festivities ashore included a band, a pancake breakfast, coffee and cookies and even the Easter Bunny with a big basket of chocolate eggs.
Many of these races can be filled with epic sailing stories, but 2018 was a pleasant and enjoyable race with consistent winds and fair weather. The start was delayed for 45minutes waiting for the westerly to fill in, but once it did, everyone was in agreement that it was worth the wait!
On the 3 Classic courses, the boats saw between 12 and 16 knots all the way to Ballenas Islands. From there the Long Course boats took off on a downwind stretch to T10. The full Easter moon was epic and all the boats saw it rise in the Northeast and it shone down on the sailors for most of the night. The first of the Short Course boats crossed the finish line at Point Atkinson at 4:30 am Saturday.
WVYC Boat First Home
On the Long Course, Peter McCarthy’s newly acquired TP-52 THE SHADOW II was first boat home. Michael Schoendorf’s very well sailed Riptide 41 BLUE finished not far behind to take the PHRF Overall win. JAM owned by Bill Fox really impressed on the Long Course; she took the ORC Overall win by a wide margin. They appeared to sail a flawless race, super-fast up wind and well worked light air on the last leg to get the win.
On the Medium Course, Ross and Marcia Macdonald’s X-41 DAIA took the line honours win (they were so fast upwind) but the experienced and always well sailed Shock 35 — EXCALIBUR, skippered by Jason Vandergaag, took the Overall win in a very large fleet of 42 boats.
WVYC Boat Line Honours on Short Course
On the Short Course, William Phillips CY 8.0 INCISOR took line honours, but the irrepressible C&C 30 SILIK skippered by Wade Harrogate prevailed once again to take the Short Course overall corrected time win.
Full race results can be viewed on the Southern Straits website at: www.southernstraits.ca
Volunteers deserve a High Five. This race is truly a labor of love for the West Vancouver Yacht Club. Mike Seper, the Race Chair and Principle Race Officer, Jennifer Ross, along with the 130+ volunteers deserve a high five! Also, thanks to our sponsors for their generous support.
It takes tremendous energy to host 75 boats from as far away as Seattle and Victoria. But hats off to the sailing crews for racing hard, for up to 40 hours (starting at 10:30 am on friday and some boats sailed right on through till 11pm Saturday) and then turning around to deliver the boats back to their home bases the very next day. And Easter Sunday was truly a howler.
HAMACHI posted some great footage of their Juan De Fuca Crossing… fully reefed and flying…some races you win and sometimes you win the deliveries. Sail on! Until April 19, 2019, when we see you all again for another great Southern Straits Race!
2019 RACE #51, APRIL 19-21
by Peter Saulsbury
The 2019 Southern Straits of Georgia Race will be remembered as one of the best and fastest ever! There were three courses, a 133-mile long course allowing the faster boats to stretch their legs, a 98-mile medium course and a 70-mile short course.
Bruce Hedrick’s pre-race forecast proved accurate (once again) with a 5 – 8 knot westerly at the start which gradually built as the fleet beat out of English Bay and tacked up the Bowen Island shore. There was a massive ebb current on the start line which really accelerated at the committee boat end and Steve Travis’s TP 52 Smoke timed the start perfectly at the boat end and jumped into a massive current ‘elevator’ before the rest of us – there’s some great drone photos and video of the start which captured Steve’s amazing start.
Most of the long course fleet left the south shore of Bowen for the long starboard tack across the Strait with the TP 52’s (Smoke, The Shadow, and Sonic) along with J/160 Jam really using their long waterlines to their advantage over us tiny 35-footers to stretch out a nice lead. A few interesting wind shifts further west on the race course created some interesting passing lanes – the J/111 65 Red Roses skippered by Alex Smyth called it well by staying north, we opted to keep more west and they did a nice job getting a jump on us before Sisters.
After Ballenas the seas flattened out and the wind lifted nicely on port tack so we gained a little back jib reaching into Sisters. Smoke really legged out on the other TP’s and rounded at 1753. The leg from Sister’s to Entrance couldn’t have been better. The most amazing full moon came up right in the east and with the crystal clear sky, lit up the race course all night – truly magical to be sliding downwind at 15+ knots boat speed with an A2 on such a beautiful evening.
We caught up and passed 65 Red Roses by Ballenas so the battle was on after that! Our timing crossing Nanaimo Harbor on the approach to Entrance couldn’t have been worse as we had to douse the chute really early to negotiate our way around two large inbound ships and then got into an interesting conversation with a tug and barge coming out of Nanaimo on the beat upwind to Ballenas!
The stiff beat from Entrance to Ballenas was bone jarring for us little 35 footers with TWS hovering between 21 to 26 knots and a steep chop. The TP 52’s reveled in the conditions and rounded fairly closely at half past midnight. We were very happy in our upwind speed and legged out on 65 Red Roses to round 36 minutes ahead of them. From Ballenas to the finish line of Point Atkinson, the NW stayed in the 20+ knot range all the way home which made for an impressive, enjoyable downwind slide home. Smoke did a nice job stretching out over The Shadow and Sonic and won line honors at 0313 – less than 3 hours after rounding Ballenas!
From the results, it looked like The Shadow and Sonic had a close finish over an hour behind Smoke, finishing within minutes of each other. The always well sailed J/160 Jam skippered by Bill Fox finished a little over an hour later to take second overall on the long course. Alex and the team on 65 Red Roses did a masterful job all race and deserve full credit for finishing first overall on the long course. On Longboard, my team did a great job pushing the boat around the course to grab the final podium spot on the long course. Ross Macdonald and his very fast X-41 Daia made short work of the beat to Sisters on the Medium Course and took line honors just before 0200 – well done to Ross who always gives an upwind clinic in these conditions!
On corrected time, John Peterson’s J/109 Legacy took Division 2 (by 8 seconds over Lodo!), Steve Blaine’s Hanse 400e Rubato won Division 3, and the Dufour 34 Invictus skippered by Vern Lhotzky took Division 4 and the Medium Course overall win. On the short course, the Hotfoot 30 XS sails by Benoit Sonrel held off some close competitors to take the Short Course line honors win. My old Flying Dutchman colleague, Huntly Gordon sailing Flyway took Division 5 and the Short Course overall win. We all had to admire those short course boats on the stiff beat to Ballenas Island on Friday afternoon/evening – tough conditions to go upwind in such small boats – really well done to them all.
As always, the host club West Vancouver Yacht Club put on a great event – thanks to Chairs Kelly Brix and Adam Ferguson and PRO Jen Ross – and of course the army of 130 volunteers and club members who made it all happen.
2020 RACE, APRIL 10-12
In response to the COVID-19 outbreak the Southern Straits Organizing Committee along with the WVYC Board of Directors has made the difficult decision to cancel the 2020 Southern Straits Race. Our focus for the race has always been to organize and run an event that puts competitor and volunteer safety at the forefront of our decisions and delivers a quality experience. We look forward to seeing you all next year for the 2021 race.