SAILING

Pauls Most Recent Sailing Reports

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John Payne Photo Coconut Grove One race today in perfect conditions again!  10-12 knots from the southeast, warm water, warm air.  I don’t think we have had a week of Star sailing this good, anywhere, in a very long time. Lars Grael turned it on today and got the win.  Brian Ledbetter continued his strong […]

John Payne Photo Coconut Grove Two races were held today on Biscayne Bay, in ideal conditions for Star racing.  The wind was again 8-12 knots from the South.  Blue skies, warm water and slightly warmer air temperature. In the first race, Brian and I shook off the morning blues, or what ever it was that […]

John Payne Photo Coconut Grove Two races were held again today on Biscayne Bay, in 8-11 knots from the south.  The wind was quite shifty again which gave everyone plenty of opportunity to move up…….. or down. In the first race Brian and I crossed the starting line too early.  This meant we had to go back and restart […]

John Payne Photo Coconut Grove The Stars are back on Biscayne Bay for the last time this season.  The “Spring Championship” is being hosted by Biscayne Bay Yacht Club.  7 races are scheduled Through Sunday. Today we had the first two races in 7-9 knots from the southeast.  These are perfect Star boat conditions. However, […]

Rosehearty (on the right) by night St. Barts The wind was a light easterly today, 7-9 knots.  This makes things a lot slower and a little more challenging when you weigh in at 500 tons. Onboard Rosehearty, we sailed a good race, probably as best we could.  However, we were no match for the speed of […]

St. Bart’s I am sailing as tactician onboard the Super Yacht, Rosehearty, this week in the beautiful French Caribbean Island of St. Bart’s.  Rosehearty is a 56 meter (182′) Perini Navi sailing yacht.  We have a crew of 37 to handle the 500 ton vessel. There are 32 yachts racing here this year. There are […]

Coconut Grove Lars Grael won the final race and his second Bacardi Cup in a row.  Lars’s success is even more remarkable as he is an amputee, missing his right leg.  He is a model of resilience.  Young Jorge Zarif with Bruno Prada crewing put in a good performance to finish second in the regatta […]

Coconut Grove Very light winds awaited the Star fleet today. The race committee started on time with about 4 knots of wind from the southeast.  We had one general recall then the Black Flag. It was very spotty out there so at times you looked pretty good then the wind would die where you were […]

Photo by Silken Coconut Grove Another picture perfect day with excellent sailing conditions. The wind was a bit lighter today starting out at 11 knots and dropping to 8 by the finish.  The fleet was well behaved on the starting line so no Black Flag today and no one was over early. We had another great […]

Coconut Grove Another perfect day for sailing.  12 knots from the Southeast and sunny skies.  Pretty deluxe situation for us down here.  The committee had a little trouble getting the line square and then we had a general recall or two so up went the black flag again.  The courses are 10 miles with 2.5 […]

Coconut Grove, Florida Another perfect day for sailing today.  A bit windier than yesterday with winds 12 to 14 knots from the East which built of some short chop on Biscayne Bay. We had one general recall on the first start and then the committee went straight to the Black Flag.  Brian and I had […]

Coconut Grove, Florida March 1, 2015 I am back in south Florida for more Star sailing.  This time the legendary Bacardi Cup.  This year is the 88th running of this event which started in 1927 in Havana. 57 boats are racing from more than 10 countries.  The competition will be tough with the Grael brothers […]

February 5, 2015, San Francisco Yesterday, US Sailing and AmericaOne announced a very exciting initiative, called Project Pipeline.  I want to give you a little personal perspective on the initiative and pass along the link to the press release. AmericaOne is a long time supporter of the US Olympic Sailing Team. Bob “Buddah” Billingham was […]

Photo Sharon Green Key West It really wasn’t our week. Two races were held today in very nice conditions and we finished third in both. Bella Mente won both races to win the class. The breeze was in from the south-southeast at about 18-20 knots. There was a fair amount of chop and the downwind […]

Tim Wilkes Photo January 22, 2015, 18:00 EST Key West The short story is we did not have a good day. We finished 3rd in both races today. In the first race, we lost by 15 seconds and in the second race by just one second! Nothing remarkable happened in the races.  Just a steady […]

January 22, 2015  0900 Bella Mente’s request for redress hearing was reopened this morning. Shockwave and Numbers were present this time. Reason prevailed and redress was denied. So Bella Mente scored a 4, 3 yesterday and all three competitors are within one point going into todays racing. More later. Paul

Photo: Steve Lapkin Key West January 21, 2015, With a forecast that was too light to race, the wind gave us a pleasant surpass, and we managed to get in two races today.  The wind came in at 6-8 knots from the north-northwest around 11:00 and the race committee was quick to jump on it. […]

“Shockwave in Traffic”, credit Tim Wilkes. Key West Two races were held today in fairly steady conditions of 7-12 knots from the south.  A first race raw started and abandoned about 3/4’ers of the way through due to lack of wind. In both races, Bella Mente had just slightly the better of us.  Nothing dramatic […]

Could not find any pictures of the racing on the site yet so I took this picture which I found pretty interesting. Day one of Quantum Key West Race week was very typical, sunshine and 8-12 knots of wind from the northeast. I am onboard George Sakellaris’ 68′ Shockwave this week and we are racing […]

Photo: Marco Oquendo/imagesbymarco.com

Coconut Grove Magnus and I came out determined to get back what was ours, and we did. We finished with a 1, 2 which was enough to move us up from 11th to 6th in the mid winters and save the overall Star Winter Series Championship by just one point. After yesterday’s broken mast, and […]

Coconut Grove Three races were sailed today on Biscayne Bay for the Star fleet. The wind was great: 15-18 from the northeast. Augur Diaz had a great day winning two of the races and Lars Grael continued to do well edging us for the win in race 1. We were in the hunt in all […]

Coconut Grove The forecast today was for a dying southerly breeze and that is what we got. Rich Raymond, Chairman of the Race Committee, amended the schedule last night and got us out there for a 10:00 start to get some racing in before the wind died. It was a good move as we got […]

Photo: Marco Oquendo/imagesbymarco.com

Coconut Grove Today was the first day of a four day event called the Star Midwinter Championship. This event plus the previous three events for the Winter Series. There will be an over all winner for the Winter Series as well as each of these individual events. The midwinter Championship is weighted double for the […]

Photo: Marco Oquendo/imagesbymarco.com

Coconut Grove Two races were held today on Biscayne Bay for the Star class. Classic conditions returned with 8-12 knot southeasterly and 80 temps. Magnus and I had a fantastic day with a 2, 1 to win the Bob Levin Memorial Trophy. Luke Lawrence sailed well to win the first race of the day just […]

Coconut Grove Yesterday morning in Ross, California there was ice on the lawn. At midnight I walked onto the back deck of Bob Norton’s Hatteras 46 at the Coral Reef Yacht Club in 80 degrees and humidity. That’s why people go to Florida in the winter! Today, the Star Class raced for the Bob Levin […]

Star Winter Series - Commodores Cup

Coconut Grove, Florida There is nothing like coming out and winning the first race on the last day. It makes the rest of the day a lot easier. There was barely 4 knots of wind for the start of race 1 today. Brian and I started in port tack, at the committee boat, hit the […]

Star Winter Series Photo's

Coconut Grove, Florida Today was the first day of the Commodores Cup which is the second regatta of the Star Winter Series down here in south Florida. There are 5 events in the series, about one a month. Today, we had three races on Biscayne Bay for the Star fleet in knots from the north. […]

Photo by Dan Phelps / SpinSheet.com

Oxford, Maryland One race was held today on the Choptank in 7-10 knots and rain. The wind was just as shifty as it has been all week. Brian and I had a decent start and sailed pretty well not he first leg (and were lucky that our side worked out well) to round the first […]

Photo by Dan Phelps / SpinSheet.com

Oxford, Maryland Two races were held today with a shifty northeasterly breeze that blew between 4 and 8 knots. Torben Grael and his crew Guilhherme Alimeida of Brazil dominated the day with a 2,3 which moved them into a 10 point lead going into tomorrow’s final race. Brian and I had a terrible first race. […]

Photo by Dan Phelps / SpinSheet.com

Oxford, Maryland Two races were held today on the Choptank in 5-10 knots of wind. Here it isn’t that the wind starts at 5 knots and builds to 10 or the reverse. Here the wind is 5-10 every minute of the day. And it shifts 30 degrees too. Brian and I finished 3rd in the […]

Star North American Championship-Day 1

Oxford, Maryland It was a long day on the water. 3 races starting at 11:00 and finishing at 16:45. So I am writing fast and there may be typos. It was a perfect clear blue sky today following thunder, lightening and rain last night. The wind was 6-9 knots form the west but at times […]

North American Star Championship 2014

The Battle Begins Tomorrow, Who Will Be the Last Man Standing? Oxford, MD 07 October 2014 On Wednesday October 8, forty two Star teams representing 5 different nations will hit the race course and contest the final Silver Star Championship title of the year: the 2014 International Star Class North American Championship hosted by the […]

Star Boat Paul Cayard

Oxford, Maryland Two races were held today on the Choptank. (Love that word. Very appropriate as the water is choppy out there!) It was clear, cold and a brisk 50 degrees when we headed out to the race course at 0930. The wind was 7-12 from the west with 30 degree shifts today which made […]

Star Boat Paul Cayard

Oxford, Maryland The Oxford Fall Wind Up is a tradition in the Star Class for 63 years. Tred Avon is the host club and this year the Wind Up also serves as the tune up regatta to the North American Championship which will be, here in Oxford, on Wednesday, November 8-11. I am back to […]

Photo By: Rolex / Daniel Forster

San Francisco One race was scheduled for today. After a brief postponement waiting for wind, the race started at 11:30 under blue skies and a moderate 12 knot breeze. The course for all the fleets on the Fort Mason race track took us outside the Golden Gate bridge for to a buoy off Pt. Diablo. […]

San Francisco Two long races today for the J70 fleet. Once again we started the day on the Fort Mason race track. The committee signaled a three lap windward-leeward course in the 8-10 knot southwesterly breeze. The current was “flooding” once again so it was all about hitting the beach for relief. We had a […]

San Francisco Friday was a very good day for us on Double Trouble. In the first race we were on the Fort Mason race course with about 10 knots of wind. We were over the start line early and had to go back and restart putting us last in the 13 boat fleet. The current […]

Photo By: Rolex / Daniel Forster

San Francisco This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Rolex Big Boat Series. Day 1 served up pretty familiar conditions. Moderate winds from the southwest for the first race then 18-22 knots for the second race of the day. There are 10 fleets spread out over three race courses. Sail boats racing from a […]

© Carlo Borlenghi.

Palma de Mallorca The short story is that we finished 2nd in today’s race, and third for the regatta. The longer story is that the wind filled in so late that only one race was possible. When it filled it was the windiest of the week, at 18 knots. On Robertissima, we had a great […]

Palma de Mallorca Two good races were held again today in slightly more wind, and plenty of sunshine. Onboard Robertissima, we started of the day with a win. We won the left side of the starting line and therefore the left side of the race course and controlled things from there. After that first race, […]