karma
As easily predicted by me, the SWYC San Diego to San Diego International Yacht Race race was a disaster. Of the 10 ORC boats that started, 6 finished.
And apparently no cruising boats finished, but how would we know? The class isn’t even listed in the results. Perhaps they had the good sense to pull the plug and not even bother? You know, just like SWYC should have had, and pulled the plug on this embarrassment. But hey, at least they have a spiffy logo.
I’m sure one of the chief bullshit artists over there will try to spin it as “A good start”, or “We really have something to build on.” No you fucking don’t. You do have mud on your face however. That is mud, isn’t it?
The Right Stuff
As a few ‘oldies’ will remember, the use of yachts and pleasure boats was obviously very restricted during World War II.
At the end of the war men who were used to a certain amount of physical deprivation were being squeezed into office jobs or other work that was restrictive, and those who had been active sailors before the war now needed to rethink how to spend their free weekends.
One such sailor was Patrick Ellam, who attended Stowe School and passed the exams to go to Oxford but chose instead to travel to France and Germany, where he became fluent in both languages. He enlisted at the outbreak of war in 1939, joined the Royal Artillery and was sent to France.
Given his familiarity with both the countries and their language, it will be no surprise to learn that a couple of years later he was recruited into the Special Operations Executive (SOE).
Unlike many in this most dangerous area of the conflict, Ellam survived the war; meanwhile, his wartime activities had given him unique experience, as well as an urgent hunger for further adventures… albeit of a less risky variety.
Read on thanks to our friends at Southern Wooden Boat Sailing.
Disaster Area
It’s funny when a YC is so incompetent that they run a once popular event so into the ground that they decide to change the race, only to make it weirder, and can only manage to attract 10 racing boats, and 6 cruising boats. We’ll get to the cruising class in a minute.
The club is SWYC, the race that they managed to ruin was the San Diego to Ensenada race, an event that used to have around 50 boats. Now their dopey San Diego to San Diego International Yacht Race has a convoluted course that doesn’t go to Ensenada, but it does round the North Coronado Island (Why not round all the of the islands that make up the Coronado Islands? Too wimpy?)
And they get away with lamely calling their race “International” because the North Island is technically in Mexico. Weak Sauce, but to be expected when one is aware of who is behind this. Oh and there will be some sort of unmanned vessel that will be a turning mark. What could possibly go wrong with that?
Did we mention the wind will be 5-10 max, and the temp is projected to be 100 degrees? Over/Under of number of finishers?
As for the Cruising “Fleet” of 6 boats, the SWYC should have hired an editor when they posted this:
ELIGIBILITY AND ENTRY
Rename the PHRF Cruising Class to Cruising Class and give it this description:
• Boats with a PHRF OWC base rating of 45 or higher and a Performance Factor less than 1.8.
• Boats will upload their latest PHRF certificate, if available. Boats without certificates will be
assigned a rating by the OA. (Oh good, add more arbitrary bullshit to an already arbitrary race)
• Non-Spinnaker entries will race in this class with their NSO (non-spin offsets). NS boats must
contact the regatta co-chairs to alert.
• Including Engine Allowance! See Cruising Class Addendum.
So they are using PHRF ratings for this class, but so despise PHRF that they took the name PHRF out of the description. That’s some first class dirt baggery right there. I bet they didn’t want people to see that. Too bad.
Back At It
Friend and contributor (while I ran that other site), Shanghai Sailor is back and I am thrilled! Battling some health issues, he is nonetheless writing again, and here he gives his perspective on the recently deceased photographer Carlo Borlenghi.
GOAT (Greatest of all times) is a term thrown around to support the actions of a individual but is so often the subject of opinion or debate. However our sport has lost an important gifted individual of our community who largely rewrote the way in which it could be portrayed.
Not a multiple Olympic Medallist or major race winner, to Call Carlo Borlenghi just a photographer would be like calling Picasso just a painter except his tool was a camera lens rather than a brush.
He turned yachting photography from a largely reportage type format into, in many instances, an art form. I actually have one of his books from years back and always marvelled at the images it contained but for many years I didn’t realise he was the author because is didn’t shout “I am Carlo”, rather, as usual, he let the work do the shouting.
It started for him when he became Azura’s photographer way back in 1983 and flowed through all the way to the present with the Volvo Ocean Race, The America’s Cup and many of the big, Rolex sponsored event covered by himself or photographers representing Studio Borlenghi.
Although I drove on occasion some of the best in the business I never had the honour to take Carlo round the race course to exercise his craft some of the results of which raised the bar of excellence, an excellence that deservedly led to his reputation not only amongst the public but amongst his peers and also led to his many awards for his work.
Not Navel Gazing
It’s not often that an extreme high tech offshore sailing project originates in the United States. We seem to be stuck navel gazing and discussing the nuances of PHRF and IMS while in Europe they are streaks ahead when it comes to pushing the boundaries of our sport. I, for one, think that it’s important to push boundaries otherwise things stagnate and people lose interest. That having been said, every now and then an American project comes along that excites the spirit and stirs the blood. Such is PGN Ocean Racing, a project by former marine Peter Gibbons-Neff and his quest to win the 2027 Mini Transat race.
I will come back to Gibbons-Neff because his story is a good one, but it’s his boat that has me blown away. Let’s just start by saying that Class Mini’s have always been on the cutting edge of offshore sailing and for each new race there is a new crop of balls-to-the-wall boats that continue to amaze. They were the first to push the development of the scow bow, the class has refined foils and sail area to displacement ratios to all-time high’s. One look at an over canvassed mini flying well above the water heading 4,000 miles from La Rochelle, France to Bahia, Brazil with just a skipper on board, and you know that there is hope for the future. And to be honest, some pretty exciting and pretty miserable, sleepless sailing ahead for the skipper.
Gibbons-Neff chose the French yacht designer Sam Manuard to draw his mini. Manuard has been at the cutting edge of mini design for a long time and he was the one who pioneered and pushed the scow bow. For this boat it looks like the design team have not held back and if the initial Instagram videos of the boat sailing (flying?) it looks like this boat is going to be a winner.
The boat, named Resolve, has the distinctive scow bow (for those not familiar, a piece on the advantages of a scow bow will be coming shortly). I am used to seeing boats like this so I was concentrating more on the foils. They look almost big enough to get a Boeing 747 airborne. The foils protrude from just under a chine in the hull, take a little dip before making a right angle turn to become a long airfoil plane with a winglet at the tip. The neat thing about these foils is that, other than lifting the boat, they stow very nicely when retracted back into the hull leaving the foil flush against the topsides with the rest curving above the sheerline.
The whole thrust of this design is clear and that is to get the boat flying as soon as possible. Too this end the scow bow helps by reducing wetted surface and therefore reduces drag, but Manuard has also added two sharp chines in the lower topsides. Chines, as we know, are added to allow the water that is stuck to the hull through surface tension to break off as it can’t make the sharp turn a chine presents. Less water stuck to the hull means less drag.
There is more to this boat but let’s take a look at the skipper who, by the way, already completed the Mini Transat in 2023. When I talked to Peter he told me that he was just a kid in school when those planes hit the World Trade Center, but that single act of terrorism stirred something in him and as soon as he could he joined the military. Peter served 10 years in the Marines as an intelligence officer with his experiences including being deployed to Helmand Province, Afghanistan as a military advisor. He was also deployed on U.S. Navy amphibious ships in the Middle East, Africa, and European theaters which included sea time in the Persian Gulf, Red Sea, Mediterranean Sea, and Atlantic Ocean. In other words he is the real deal.
As a way to give back and to continue to inspire, Peter’s project is part of U.S. Patriot Sailing. Here is a cut and paste that describes things. “U.S. Patriot Sailing is dedicated to supporting the Veteran community in providing a competitive racing team that helps Veterans navigate the hardships of transition, rehabilitation, and the complex life challenges associated with combat deployments.”
There are exciting times ahead for that campaign and hopefully it will inspire others to push the edge a little. For more take a look here, and for that Instagram video look here.
So…White
Yes it’s Rainbow, a big, beautiful, lumbering J Class boat. Is the irony lost on everyone that for a boat named Rainbow, the only color seen among the 900 crew is white?
sail on
Mark Michaelsen from Dry UV and I used to be pretty tight, did a lot of business together. Life is short.
On Wednesday September 23rd 2026, Mark Michaelsen passed away in the early morning hours. This came as a shock to the family and was completely unexpected. He was loved and is still loved deeply by his family, and we’re sure the same is true for his friends and everyone else around the world. From working out to selling apparel to weather forecasting to coaching kids football to, most importantly, being a loving and caring father and husband. His wife Julie and his children Sierra, Blake, Parker, and Troy are all together in overcoming this, and we’re wishing him the absolute best in wherever his next chapter brings him.
Mark always mentioned “I’ve lived enough for 3 or 4 lifetimes. Don’t be sad if I pass. My life has been amazing”. He told us to “Enjoy every sunrise and sunset”, and “To enjoy every day like it’s your last”. 63 years old feels far too soon for him to be gone, but we’re glad he passed in a way he would be happy with. Coming back from vacation with his wife, making a post for how much he loves her, going to sleep, and passing away peacefully simply never waking up.
We love you so so much Dad. We know you’re heading off over the rainbow, and we hope to see each other again some day.
To the absolute best Husband and Father any family could hope for.
-The Michaelsen Family
Hang On To Your Tits
For the last few days, it’s a bit of a case of hang on to your tits for the sailors competing in the Golden Globe Race. An unusual weather event is taking place and it’s pummeling the fleet with gale force winds and large, uneven seas. Where there are usually warm and moderate tradewinds; champagne sailing as it’s known among sailors, there has instead been an intense low pressure system right slap bang in the middle of most of the fleet.
The two leaders, France’s Damien Guillou aboard his Rustler 36, Solarem and Ireland’s Pat Lawless aboard his Saltram Saga 36, Silvermines Hydro are to the south and while they are feeling the effects of the system, it’s not as bad and as the low pressure is moving toward the north west, away from them and they will be the first to be sprung free.
There is some good news, if you can call it that. This is a baptism by fire for the sailors and a way to really test their boats. The water is warm and so is the air. If you are going to find a weak spot in the rig or hull, this is a pretty good time to do so. The other option is in the Southern Ocean where some low pressure systems can make this one look like a baby sister and the air is cold. So is the water. The other bit of good news is that boats are scattered in the vicinity of the Cape Verde Islands which can offer relief and help if necessary.
Update: The middle of the fleet got hit with a proper wallop with some of the competitors reporting 50 knots of sustained wind and large lumpy seas. American skipper Gunnar Christensen sailing the Hans Christian 34 cutter Pampoen was one of the worst hit, but says that he learned a lot from the storm and it has better prepared him for what he might expect in the Southern Ocean. He, like most of the boats suffered some damage but none of it a game changer which speaks volumes about how well the boats have been prepared for this voyage.
Right now it’s a case of the rich getting richer as the two front skippers, Damien Guillou and Pat Lawless continue to bang upwind in the southeast trades making it a very long port tack, but they are around 800 miles ahead of the main pack who are still dealing with the leftovers from the storm and the doldrums which are always a challenge.
The low pressure has since been upgraded to a Tropical Storm and has been given the name Gonzalo. It continues to move away from the GGR fleet looking for some other sailors to bother. – Brian Hancock.
Slack Jawed Yokels
According to the Southwestern Yacht Club in San Diego (The club you join when you simply aren’t of high enough caliber to join SDYC), this is how you run the only interesting race you have during the entire year, the San Diego to Ensenada Race:
Do not promote it.
Do not advertise it.
Do not solicit entries.
Do not…
Oh wait, what? They aren’t even racing to Ensenada now?? Well what are they doing instead? The race is now called the San Diego to San Diego International Yacht Race?? What the hell does that mean – never even leave the dock and declare yourself a winner?
And if that isn’t the case, then what is the course, you ask? Less than a week before the race, here is the only information SWYC has provided:
The Racing Area covers the general locale known as San Diego Bay, Los Coronados Islands, the Pacific Ocean, and will include Mexican waters. For navigation, refer to NOAA Charts #18765 and #18733. The estimated distance will be 40nm. 7.3 The finishing area is in the vicinity of San Diego Channel Buoy #5.
Hahaha, are they fucking kidding? Sadly, and predictably they are not. So, a clusterfuck then. When you involve halfwits, this is what you get. So if the race starts Oct 3, when will the actual course be revealed? That would be Oct 1. It’s almost like they are trying to be idiots, but with them, no effort is required.
And how, you may also wish to ask, is this being received by the racing community? With four days until race day, there are zero PHRF entries (As these idiots have also apparently killed PHRF racing, along with the Cortez Racing Association. They are very incestuous), 10 ORC entries, and 6 cruising boats.
Everything is Awesome!
Fake Plastic Trees
Yes, the Eye-talians won the AC 40 preliminary regatta and props to them (I can say eyetalian – i’m 42% eyetalian). But what really jumped out was the thoroughly impressive last and next to last finishes of Team Pome. Ben Ainslie really has the teams humming.
It seems a bunch of AC whiners didn’t much like our pretty obvious commentary on their sponsor choices, but we care not what they have to say, we know we’re justified in what we said. Will the same bunch of whiners now defend GB here are well?
Title inspiration thanks to Radiohead. (It would been too obvious to choose Karma Police).