July 2024 | Issue #45

Nationals Results
Nationals Analysis
July Rankings
Saratoga Internationals (Sign up Now! It’s Not Too Late)
From the President
2025 Nationals Location Announced
Nationals Photos
and as always: Please support our sponsors…they support us!

National Championship Results

Y-Flyer National Summary – by the Lorings

Thanks to my wonderful sweetheart, Margaret, as she is just awesome and is one of the best crews out

there! She is a professional and keeps everything clean up front, we don’t ever get agitated out on the

course, always having fun and loving sailing together. Thanks to all our Y-Flyer class family, we love

sailing and playing with you all.

Day 1 - Race One

Race One Strategy before start

- Midline tack out and catch first shift

What actually happened?

Nice first leg rounded just in behind Clint, started to catch him downwind and gybed out back onto starboard. Wind filled in from the middle-left side downwind and Clint took off into a nice lead, we dropped back a lot. After rounding leeward mark, we exchanged a few tacks, and I was able to get some clean air and get us into a tacking duel, Clint was not having it and we split tacks. He went off

onto starboard and created a nice lead around the second mark. Would say left middle paid. Bit un-eventful downwind other than Paul and Andrew getting in pretty close to us. As we went up next leg I split hard right and both Clint and Paul headed left. Huge shifts up the legs and we were hoping for a nice right to come in (didn’t) happen. Clint with a nice win!! Paul and I shot the line and we just got him by an inch. Funny Clint talked about the boats around (we were the Charleston power couple, Paul and Marie Abdullah were the blue man group, as they were wearing blue that day).

Day 1 - Race Two

Strategy

- Midline towards pin start and tack.

What actually happened?

Great start and tacked out, got a nice lefty and then headed towards right for a couple hundred yards to the next nice right shift – game over, built a substantial lead and covered from that point with Paul Abdullah in second. Key to me was get off the line clean and be able to tack on a shift!

Day 2 – Race Three

Strategy

- Middle of line towards pin and tack. Pretty major pin favor.

What Happened

Awesome start got out and caught a couple great shifts, dug in on a nice lift out left and boom(!) we got the header we were needing (layline on a huge left shift)– nice lead at first mark and did not look back.

Day 2 – Race Four

Strategy

- Middle of line towards pin and tack �� Sound familiar – then play shift

What Happened

Good start down towards pin. Paul got the pole position at the pin.

We both tacked and headed right for like 5 minutes, probably changed positions 5 times between us on a long port tack together. Felt in the puffs we were quick and lulls Paul was quick, all in all he gained on us in pure boat speed this race. Couldn’t catch them and Dave Irons came out of the right on first leg going fast (real fast). Tried all we could do to catch up to either of them, but they were gone and the left came in for both of them as I tried an attempt at hitting the right corner. Dave was super-fast in that light stuff, he had a gear at times I would love to have on our boat.

Day 3 – Race Five

Strategy - Huge shifts out this morning, bit spooky with a small lead to say the least! Miss one of those shifts and this thing could get rough. Focused on getting off the line and finding that first big shift (eyes out of boat sailing would be critical on this day ). Would call the breeze very unsettled – with 30-degree shifts both ways, but it did seem most of the pressure would come in from the left.

What Happened

Big shifts over the course. We started down the line a bit, Committee boat was favored, but I just wanted to get off clean and be in the game. We stayed on starboard for a bit longer than I wanted with Howard on our quarter all the way, didn’t know where Paul was at the time. Kept on Margaret to keep an eye out, halfway up the beat saw we had a pretty good lead on him and rounded the top mark first! Had 100-yard lead at bottom and headed around the right bottom mark towards left to get clean air around the downwind boats. Quickly grabbed a couple nice shifts and built a bigger lead keeping an eye on Paul. Felt pretty comfortable (that is always bad ), was hitting the shift and very in phase. UNTIL we tacked on a huge left shift (biggest of the day ), Paul headed onto starboard and I brilliantly stayed on this huge lift on port. We didn’t even look, but Paul was now on a bigger lift and now crossing us (oh boy). We split gybes downwind and Paul built a nice lead on us. Heading upwind finally the breeze

started to come in a bit and we are very fast once out and hiking, quickly started to catch Paul, but not enough runway and Paul & Marie beat us by about a half boat length. What a tight regatta this one was, now it’s the one who beats who in the final race (and did I say it was SHIFTY?).

Day 3 – Race 6

Strategy – Be a bit more aggressive, grab lead early and cover! Wind started shifting hard right with some velocity in it, really weird conditions. 30-degree shift and velocity from 5 to 10 knots.

What Happened

Nice Start and it was hard left, tacked immediately and was laying the weather mark. Finally doing some hiking which both Margaret and I like. Wind stayed left all the way up and we just about laid the weather mark on port from the start, grabbed nice lead with Mark Buchanan behind us. Mark fought hard high and we let him go right over the top of us, Mark had slight lead at the bottom with Will Hankel in close 3rd. Paul and Marie had a tough first leg and were a good bit behind. I rounded the right

mark behind Mark B and sailed a little way on starboard, then tacked on a small left shift. Asked Margaret where Paul had gone, and we found out quickly HE WAS CROSSING US! in a huge right shift. Paul tacked right on top of us and we quickly tacked out to clear our air headed left. Paul stayed on port and we headed left for another 100 yards or so until BAMM(!) an auto tack and huge left shift with velocity. We are now headed straight at the weather mark hiking hard, looked down and no one was in our puff, Paul was headed with little wind on port. We had a 100-yard lead at top mark and built on it downwind, covered from that point on and got the win.

Summary

Felt key was stay off the sides of the course, play the shifts up middle and keep bow down in the lifts for

speed to next shift. Starting away from the pack as much as possible (low density).

Setup-wise with Evolution Sails:

- Pretty loose

- Never changed jib lead placement

- Main – tended to keep centerline with some twist

- Heal – when the chop was bad – A LOT otherwise 5 degrees or so

- Didn’t mess with rig tension, might have been a bit tight Day 2

Y Flyer Internationals (sailsaratoga.org)

See the website for more information and registration:

For many, it will be a long drive, but well worth it. Arrive early! Saratoga is a tourist destination.

After dinner on Tuesday we are featuring a tasting from a Saratoga distillery

We’re here to help you get the most out of your regatta experience.

Call Paul Abdullah for any sailing questions with tuning or tactical advice

904-571-6051

Paul.Abdullah@NorthSails.com

From the President (present and almost past) by Amanda Smith Hodges

I am still in recovery from our trip to Carlyle for Nationals last week. Heat waves in the mid-west are BRUTAL! With a heat index of 107 at one point, I worried the lake would dry up before we could finish the regatta. If it hadn’t been for the fabulous wind 4 of the 5 race days, I’d have thought that the devil had come to Illinois to sail in the Y Nationals.

CSA delivered on junior sailors and put together 4 teams to fill out the Junior Nationals with a total of 6 teams competing. I want to personally thank the boat owners who lent their boats to strange teenagers so that they could sail in our fabulous class event. Shout out to Dan Haile, Jennifer Garrett, Shelby Hatcher-Gossnell and Carlin Hodges for their generosity and support of junior sailing. The young sailors took excellent care of the boats from launch to covering. They all reported a great experience. Congrats go to our new 2024 Junior National Champions, Carter Hood and Sophia Wagnon from CSA. They were tough competitors and handled the heavy air like seasoned champs. Second was Frances Hanson and Oliver Putnam, who had never sailed together before this regatta, but vow to win the whole thing in Charleston next year. They figured out how to sail on flat, shallow, huge lakes. Lots of lessons learned.

The highlight of the regatta was the ‘retirement’ party for our amazing Secretary Emeritus, Paul White. Look for photos of the reception on Thursday (traditionally the off night during the nationals) elsewhere in this Flyer. The entire regatta, along with some party crashers: Gerry and Joanne Callahan, Dave and Carolyn Shearlock, Greg Kleffner to name a few, showed up to honor a sailor who has given 35 years to our class. “Sox” not only wore his signature red socks, but Rick made sure he had the bling to go with his feet. Paul’s gold necklace with a large Y dangling along with a sequined red blazer were perfect attire for the occasion. Souvenir koozies were a great reminder for every one of the great party we had. Just in case we celebrated too much to remember what we were celebrating.

Big thanks to Greg Fisher for coming out and helping tune up the Evolution sails that arrived with several boats for their maiden voyage. Apparently, the tuning guide is accurate since Clint Hodges adjusted his rig and won the first race! Evolution also helped with a raffle to raise money for the CSA junior program. Doug Kinzer won that jib even though my granddaughter drew the winning number. Kids these days….. No family loyalty.

The regatta came down to the last race of the 6 race series with no one else with points even near David Loring and Paul Abdullah. David, with super crew, Margaret Bost, took the last race to win the 2024 Y Flyer National Championship and represent our class in the Championship of Champions this coming October. Paul, with “the Beast” Marie, were nipping at their heels in second over all.

Interesting notes if I counted correctly: 25 of the 35 teams were made up of family members sailing together. Twelve of those were couples. (See, couples CAN sail a Y successfully together!) Eight were parent-child teams and two were grandparent-grandchild teams. I’m not sure of the oldest, but the youngest sailor was just turned 7. The oldest boat had 141 years on it and the youngest boat had 42 years on it. The regatta chair has 6 kids. The class president has 6 kids. Wow! The Y class is an awesome group of sailors and families.

Big thanks to Tracy Sykes for taking the Y class helm starting in 2025. Give Nile Hatcher a round of applause for accepting the task of secretary/treasurer following in Paul’s red footprints. And I am eternally grateful for the continued guidance and constant support from Mark Buchanan for taking the website challenge. To all the area reps and Doug Kinzer for stepping up to the plate for next year, thanks.

Everyone, please keep your boats wrapped up and ready to travel so that in three weeks we will be together again on another Y Flyer starting line for the Internationals at Saratoga, NY. And a year from now, June 16-20, 2025 we will do it all again on Charleston Harbor for Nationals.

The Sailing Siren,

Amanda Smith Hodges, Y2660 & Y2813

Y-Flyers and Friends: