October was a busy month for sailboat racing in San Diego. While the rest of the country slowly slips into Fall, we were out racing. The month started off with the October One Design Weekend which utilized (again) Summer Greene's powerboat "42" as a signal boat in Corinthian's absence. Concurrent with the Etchells fleet ODW was the J/105 SoCal Championship. SDYC's Dennis Conner, relatively new to the J/105 fleet, put out an excellent effort and finished second behind long time J/105 sailor Gary Mozer (LBYC) in Current Obsession 2.
The same weekend, over the point at the Mission Bay Model Boat Pond, George Szabo was a big fish in that small pond. Szabo added the CR914 (radio control boats) National Championship to his impressive sailing resume. "I began racing RC boats in 2009 and it has taken me this long to dial in my program. There is a lot to learn from the fleet guys like David Ryan and David Ramos." George described the challenges as similar to big regatta - a really big regatta. This nationals featured 24 races in two days, and someone calculated that competitors walked about 7 miles... while they followed the racing action up and down the boat pond.
After day one and 14 races, Szabo had a solid lead, but realized that he had to stay with his competitors to not blow the lead. Figuring course tactics, splitting or staying with the fleet, tuning your boat for a wide range of conditions and developing a feel for the boat balance as transmitted through the servos and control stick were details that took George time and effort to refine. If you would like to know more about the radio controlled fleet at San Diego Yacht Club, visit their webpage.
To wrap up the month, the J/105 North American Championships got underway after months of planning and preparation. Chris Perkins (St.Francis Yacht Club) sailed his Masquerade to an overall victory in the four day, nine race series. Dennis Conner (DC’s Pholly) finished third followed by Chuck Driscoll /Tom Hurlburt in Blow Boat in fourth.
Corinthian, the yacht club’s signal boat which has been in the boat yard getting new engines, finally returned after much anticipation. A profound thanks to Summer Greene for making her 35’ Bayliner “42” available for use in the interim.