Around Long Island Race: A Six Minute Difference

by Ralph Wuest

1990

The Around Long Island Race starts off Staten Island, passes around Montauk Point, and ends in Manhasset Bay at Sea Cliff Yacht Club. So what was in store for us this year - gentle winds moving us to and fro as the poets might once have put it, or something to test the fullest expectations of our C&C 37, Wuestwind's designer?

Time would tell. Our voyage started on Wednesday morning, timed so we could motor through Hellgate with quiet waters and then pick up the outgoing tide to help push us down the East River- past the magnificent landmarks of the east side of Manhattan, and under the six bridges connecting Queens and Brooklyn to Manhattan.

Thursday. The race begins. Ten separate divisions of approximately fifteen boats each, and each boat jockeying for a lead starting position. Pulses quicken, senses sharpen, aggression surfaces- all under the tight control of the rules of the road, better known as the International Racing Rules.

A good start! But immediately, the wind, coming out of the east, began to pick up-and up- to twenty two knots. Since our direction is east the message is clear: Wuestwind and everyone else will beat directly into the wind.

We worked our way out of New York Harbor into the ocean and into shipping lanes with their huge container ships crossing ahead and behind us. The waves began to increase in height until the boat would climb over one wave and then pound into the next one. Rising out of one trough and cresting the wave our speed built up to 6 1/2 knots, only to drop to 2 knots as we smashed into the next wave. Also in trouble was Joe Williams who kept son Greg busy heeling every so often in order to wash off the deck. We tried sailing far out into the ocean looking for long rollers and then practically up to the beaches looking for small chop. Nothing worked. Add to these conditions 150 racing boats crisscrossing each other on opposite tacks for the entire time. Needless to say there were two collisions. This went on for almost thirty hours before we finally reached Montauk Point. But the change at Montauk! The wind was now directly behind us and the water was smooth. I will leave to the imagination the collective sigh of relief from our crew as we finished this first phase of the race.

For the next phase we raised our spinnaker and went into high gear. The infamous and frightening Plum Gut was pure anti-climax as we shot through it escorted by two other spinnakered boats - one on our port and one on our starboard beams. The flight (that's what it seemed me) from Plum Gut to Hempstead Harbor took about eight hours and was done on one long spinnaker reach with speeds occasionally better than eight knots.

Wuestwind finished eighth in our division of four- teen, with a corrected time of 40.3 hours. But the irony of this grueling race was that the fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth places were separated by less than six minutes and ninth and tenth places were less than twenty minutes behind.

Next year we try again. A big question: How do we shave six minutes off our time?