The Sappho Race: Gone with the Wind

by Ralph Wuest

1992

This was no pleasant weekend sail. Blustery and windy, we were set for an exciting race. Little did we know how exciting it would be that morning.

From the moment of the starting gun, the winds were howling at 30 knots. Wuestwind, our 17,000 pound, C&C 37 should have an advantage over Margaret E, J. Abullarage's lightweight 135 and Blue Parrot, Joe Falzone's bantamweight Tripp 34. Other brave souls included the teams of Williarns/Pavlacka in their C&C 30 and Salty, Skip Barfley's 42 foot New Yorker.

The first leg from the LN buoy to Big Tom was an uneventful beat. We were doing fairly well, staying a bit behind the J35 but ahead of everyone else. Rounding Big Torn with the wind now behind us reading 20 knots relative. I decided that the wind was too strong for us to raise our spinnaker, a sail so large that we can't even open it fully in our back yard when we wash or fold it. Much to my chagrin, I noticed that Margaret E, the J35 raised its spinnaker ahead of us, and Blue Parrot, Joe Falzone's Tripp 34, raised his spinnaker behind us. We maintained our regular Genoa even though there was plenty of second guessing on our boat.

Needless to say, with the big sails flying, both ships increased their speed considerably and Blue Parrot passed us while Margaret E pulled far ahead. I really had not made such a terrible error in judgment , because after 5 or 10 minutes high wind gusts put both ships in trouble. Margaret E caught a gust from the side which caused her to broach. AU we could see was a spinnaker fluttering in the wind as they abandoned using it and tried to pull it in.

Blue Parrot also caught a gust, broached, but was unable to retrieve the sail. We could see her lying on her side in the wind, come back up, and go over on her side again. The next thing we saw was the sail flutter away from the boat as they released all the lines, except that it was still fastened at the top of the mast, flying out almost perpendicular to it. He was still trying to retrieve it when we passed him on the way to the second mark at Hewlet Point by Port Washington.

'Me third leg, toward Mamaroneck was a beat into the wind with rough seas. At " point Margaret E had capitalized on the spinnaker run and grabbed a large lead. Blue Parrot finally managed to down her spinnaker by sailing straight down wind, and then had to practically run over it in the water in order to get it into the boat. She passed us before we rounded Hewlet Point. We rounded third with Skip Barltey's Salty right behind us.  

Looking back as we headed for Mamaroneck, I noticed Skip coming up to the mark and just keep on going straight. We tried to figure out what he was trying to do, but immediately the high winds and rough seas took all our attention. Only later did we find out that Skip's tiller broke in two, leaving too little to steer the boat in those conditions.  

The third leg was beating into the wind; nothing exciting happened outside of the fact that we had a series of 40 knot gusts. 'Mere were no position changes; however, we noticed that as Blue Parrot rounded the mark about a quarter mile ahead of us. She was going like a locomotive. It looked like one of those wind surfers skimming across Little Neck Bay on a windy day. When we got to the mark, we realized that that leg would be a broad reach, a lumbering reach for us but a spectacular reach for Parrot. She was already almost out of sight and going like a speedboat. I later found out that she had caught up to and passed Margaret E. on that leg.

At this point we were sailing alone. We no longer had Salty in sight and Windspiel was a good distance behind; but with the difference in handicaps, we weren't sure where anyone stood on a 64 corrected base. As we carne up to "46A", and rounded for the final leg of the race, I decided that perhaps we might be close to the leaders who had to give us lots of handicap time. So we decided to venture our spinnaker, since the wind was now directly behind us and the apparent wind was as low as 15 knots.

The spinnaker deployed nicely and we were soon reading 7 1/2 on our speedo. We quickly reached the point at Fort Totten and just as we had land abeam of our ship, a gust of wind broadsided us and we immediately found ourselves in a broach. The boat lay over on its side and the spinnaker collapsed. As soon as the spinnaker collapsed, the boat righted itself and immediately the spinnaker filled again with a frightening boom and then began flailing in the wind. The sudden stress on the after guy fitting snapped it leaving nothing to hold the spinnaker. At this moment our daughter Becky, who was foredeck person, yelled that we had a small tear in the spinnaker and to get it down immediately. By the time someone could release the halyard and lower the sail, the tear had gone completely across the center of the spinnaker and up and down the leach of the sail. In five seconds we had destroyed a multi-thousand dollar sail.

But back to the race! We raised our genoa again and finished, crossing the line approximately five minutes corrected time behind Margaret E and Blue Parrot. It was a day that will remain in our memories as one of the toughest, costliest, and unusual races that we've ever sailed. It was awe inspiring to see the Margaret E handled so well while we were struggling to keep out boat under control in those high winds. Also, we found out after the race that on the leg when she took off on us, the Parrot was reading 18 knots on her speedometer. Even Sappho would have been thrilled with that.