Western Hemisphere Championship

A small fleet of Stars has turned up here in Mississippi for the Western Hemisphere Championship also known as the Spring Championship. There is one Spring Championship in Europe and one in North America each year.

This year there are 18 boats here in Pass Christian. My crew, Austin Sperry, lives here so I am staying with him and his wife Sally.

The Pass Christian Yacht Club has been in existence since 1849 and there has been sailing here on the Gulf Coast for 300 years. The only time I have raced on the Gulf Coast prior to this was the 1985 Spring Championship in New Orleans, at the Southern Yacht Club. There is a long standing tradition of racing Stars here on the Gulf Coast.

The schedule for this week is for two races per day, for four days, starting today. There will be one discard in the series.

The forecast for the week is fairly breezy every day with thunderstorms and lots of rain today. So much for the nice sunshine we enjoyed yesterday.

Today the fleet had a practice race which Austin and I managed to win. They say it is bad luck to win the practice race but I wanted to check again to see if that is still true. We also have #13 as our bow number this week so maybe all of that working together is good luck.

In any case, we are lucky to be down here and racing!

If you are waiting for an America’s Cup update, apparently the New York Supreme court issues decisions on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Today is Tuesday so standby.

Paul Cayard