Gaspar Regatta at ST. PETERSBURG YACHT CLUBJanuary 12 - 13
Story
2013 Gaspar Regatta


The first regatta of the Windmill sailing year was held in beautiful Saint Petersburg, Florida in the kind of weather most people from up north dream about in the middle of January, sunny with temperatures in the low 80's. We had 10 boats in the Windmill fleet with 13 in the Snipe fleet and if it wasn't for the logos on the sails it would have been tough to tell which boats were which from a distance. I believe Clark Mills borrowed a lot of the design from the Snipe to design the Windmill.

Day one wind was predicted 5 to 15kts but racing was delayed due to the wind being non-existent at our scheduled start time so most of us walked across the road to the street market where the aroma of many different kinds of food cooking wafted throughout the air. Hundreds of people from the community brought
their kids and dogs to enjoy the open market.

After about a one hour delay the AP came down and we headed out in light air. Our only race of the entire regatta was a 4 leg Windward/Leeward which was shortened from a 6 leg W/L because if it hadn't been shortened we wouldn't have finished the race due to the quickly dying air. The line was set square but the current played a huge factor since it was running across the course which meant that if sailing to the left side of the windward mark would have most likely stalled a boat trying to get back to the right side because of the light air. Most boats only made two tacks getting to windward and sailed almost straight to the mark. Heading down wind on the last leg the wind moved forward with a close race between Ethan Bixby and John Jennings. John managed to eek past Ethan to win the regatta.

Dinner Saturday night at Saint Pete Yacht Club was outstanding, we all had cocktails, lots of laughs, and a great time at a very nice, hospitable, yacht club.

Saint Pete Yacht Club did a great job and for a very reasonable price. We will be back! Thank you to everyone who participated in this regatta and to all who helped organize it.

Colin Browning
Result
PosBoatNameTotalRace 1
13803John Jennings & Michelle Graham11
25700Ethan Bixby & Karen Goforth22
34955Lin Robson & Susan Davidson33
43497Donna Sue Marks & Jeff Marks44
55271Diggs Vann & Cindy Vann55
65070Lon Ethington & Margaret Gimmi66
74922Dede Plessner & Beau Plessner77
84481Colin Browning & Eric Mann88
93958Ritch Riddle & Ken Friedman99
102049Lisa Fath & Nicky Valentini1010
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