CEDAR POINT REGATTA KICKS OFF SEASON

Fast Sails And Regatta Support At Its Best

The Cedar Point One Design Regatta kicks off the sailing season in Connecticut. After a long winter, fifty teams competing in five different classes were avid to get on the water and have some quality racing time. Great sailing conditions with easterly winds on the light side 4-10 knots with strong currents on both days. A stellar organization by the CPYC volunteers members guaranteed the weekend fun.

North Sails provided daily pre-racing tips and weather debrief. One Design experts Allan Terhune, Zeke Horowitz, Brian Hayes and Jack Orr shared insights during the morning meetings while sailors grabbed some freshly brewed North coffee.

Here’s a quick summary of each class:

J/70

Very close racing for the top three boats going into the last day and last race. Oivind Loretzen’s NINE won the event with Joshua Goldman’s team Building A in second and Molly & John Baxter Team Vineyards Vines in third place. All top three boats powered by North Sails XCS-2 mainsail and J-6 jib.

Our J/70 experts Allan Terhune sailed on Building A: “Our goal was to sail the races as best we could. We were actually leading all three races, but could not hang on. It was a very competitive and fun regatta.”

North clients dominated the J/70 Class finishing 1,2,3,4,5*,7,8 . Top three boats used the XCS-2 Mainsail and the J-6 High Clew Jib.

Here’s Allan’s three takeaways from the regatta:

Rig Tune – Most folks knew to loosen the rig, but when they do this, they fail to pull on some backstay to help keep prebend in the rig and also keep the rig static. Building A was very fast upwind with this set up. It let the main be a little more draft aft and you could feel the boat accelerate quite well.

Crew Work – Crew work on the J/70 is key. You can tell teams that have sailed together for a while and those who have not. Our team struggled because we have not sailed together that much and we were not in perfect harmony on all the maneuvers.

Conditions Change From Day to Day – On Saturday the teams who went right did really well, due to current and pressure.This was discussed at the debrief on Sunday morning. On Sunday the left was pretty strong because the course was further out into the sound and the current was more even, putting emphasis on pressure and angle of wind more than current. Keeping options open and an open mind are key to venues like CPYC.

Beneteau 36.7

Alistair Duke with his crew on Frequent Flyer finished strong with four bullets in a row, to win the regatta. He struggled in the first race, but once he changed gears was the boat to beat. Alistair used a North Sails 3Di NORDAC mainsail and a 3DL Class Genoa. Lou Melillo and his Surface Tension team was a strong second using standard 3Di sails. Third place was Dave Schrader from Housatonic Boat Club. Learn more about Beneteau 36.7 sails >>

Clients on Frequent Flyer finished strong with four bullets in a row, to win the regatta. They used North Sails 3Di NORDAC mainsail.

J/88

Iris Vogel and her crew on Deviation held off Mike Bruno’s Wings to win the J-88 Class by one point. Third place was Kevin Marks with his team on Velocity. Mike and Kevin both use North OOD standard Class sails. Learn more about J/88 sails >>

J/109

Bill Sweetser’s Rush sailed consistently, placing in the top four every race, won the class and the trophy for winning the biggest class in the regatta. Emoticon skippered by Jonathan Rechschaffer, started the regatta with three bullets, but struggled to shift gears and had a couple bad races, moving them into second. Third place was Julia ODowd and her team on TBD with her best class finish to date. Julia is one of the original owners and has stuck with the class since 2006. Both Jonathan and Julia have North OOD class sails. Learn more about J/109 sails >>

J/105

The light air was very challenging for the J/105s. The 105 results were extremely tight with five boats within one point for first place, three of them all tied for first. The regatta title came down to the last race to determine the tiebreaker. Conundrum from Larchmont Yacht Club took the top spot, followed by Atraxis from Lloyd Harbor Yacht Club. Third place was Laura Bea, who traveled up from New Rochelle. Learn more about J/105 sails >>