"It's never like this here" How many times have you heard that at a regatta? Marina del Rey dished out a wide variety of conditions over the weekend ranging from an 8-knot easterly building and becoming southerly on Saturday to a 15-knot westerly building to 20+ with HUGE seas on Sunday.

Santa Barbara's "Team Opti Power" swept the podium in Blue Fleet (ages 11-12) with Miguel Ferreira, Quinn Wilson and Lucas Pierce finishing first, second and third respectively.

The prospect of rain forecast on-and-off over the course of the weekend kept a handful of sailors away, but a strong contingent from the San Francisco Bay area resulted in a very-well attended regatta with 52 racers in all-37 in the Championship Fleet and 15 in the Green (Novice) Fleet.

Many of the young sailors arrived at the boat park early Saturday morning to begin the ritual of carefully tuning their boats: checking mast rake, carefully tying each little square knot at every lashing along the luff and foot, attaching mast collars, tying in dagger boards and generally getting prepared for the day's racing. The only rain of the day fell while they were in the yacht club at the competitor's briefing.

It was a long, cold tow out of the largest man-made small boat harbor in the United States. The race committee set up the course near the harbor entrance, not far from the Venice Pier. The breeze was initially offshore, with 20-30 degree oscillations. The kids worked hard on observing the clouds and trying to pick up a pattern in the windshifts while the committee worked hard on trying to set up a course.

After a long postponement and a 90-degree shift to the south, the race committee set a long windward-leeward course. The first start resulted in a general recall due to a huge pin-end bias and-after another postponement and a reset of the line-racing got underway. The weather leg took forever as the sailors fought upwind in lumpy confused seas and up to two knots of adverse current.

Things were looking good for Santa Barbara's Team Opti Power as Quinn Wilson rounded the weather mark in first place, Cooper Weitz (of CalYC, but sailing with SBYC for this regatta) rounded fourth and Lucas Pierce rounded fifth. The formula seemed to be to work the right early, take a lift across the course about two-thirds of the way up the beat and then work the shifts up the middle left. Once around the weather mark and into the current, zoom, you were gone and not to be caught. There were very few lead changes between the leeward mark and the finish.

The race committee shortened up the weather leg and fired off three more races in an average of about 10 knots of breeze. Despite a tough first race, Santa Barbara's Miguel Ferreira soon found his wheels and scored all top ten finishes in races 2-4 and finished the day on a high-note with a second place in race four. Matthew Pierce also had his best race of the regatta with a 17th in race four despite being only nine-years old and competing with kids as old as 15.

Quinn Wilson had a great day with finishes of 1, 10, 2, 1 and the prospect of throwing out the ten if two or more races were sailed on Sunday. Jack Barton of San Francisco held the top spot with all top-five finishes.
Sunday dawned cool and breezy. Two base layers under foulies and plenty of sunscreen was the call for the day as a sunny skies and a clearing breeze followed Saturday's front.

Coach Craig Wilson got the team on the tow, but the race committee held them behind the breakwater while conditions were being assessed. Eventually the green light was given and the seven-foot prams were met by over fifteen knots of breeze and huge seas immediately upon leaving the protection of the breakwater. While not being particularly windy by Optimist standards, the head-high breaking waves made sailing difficult (and intimidating) for some of the smaller sailors. At just over 50 lbs., Matthew Pierce decided he had seen enough and retired to the coach boat for the day.

Despite being in contention for overall honors, Quinn Wilson was also forced to retire due to an abdominal strain. He felt as though he could get the boat around the course with significant pain, but couldn't hike hard enough to keep himself in contention in the conditions.
As the wind and seas continued to build, Team Opti Power was down to Miguel, Cooper, and reluctantly, Lucas.

It was a big-kid day for sure and especially a big kid from windy San Francisco day. The 100 lb. plus kids with experience in big breeze thrived in the conditions. Miguel isn't particularly big, but nobody works harder on the racecourse. He made up for his lack of bulk with lots of hard hiking and perseverance and was rewarded for his effort with two top-ten finishes on the day.

By the time Sunday's third race rolled around, the breeze had built to over 20 knots. Lucas had conquered his fear and was ready roll. With seven-foot waves literally breaking under the race committee boat however, the RC had seen all the rolling they could take and decided to pull the plug on the day's racing and call it a regatta.

It was too breezy for a downwind tow, so most of the sailors sailed all the way back to the YC before being met at the dock by their shore crews (i.e. parents). Time to hit everything with a quick freshwater rinse and leave the gear for mom and dad to load and tie down while heading for the showers.

Cooper Weitz (on loan from CalYC) was a great addition to the Santa Barbara team and finished third overall and third in Red Fleet (13 years and older). Miguel Ferreira finished first in Blue Fleet (11 & 12 year olds) and fifth overall--a great result! Quinn Wilson finished second in Blue Fleet and 10th overall, despite only sailing one day and Lucas Pierce finished third in Blue Fleet and 13th overall out of 37 boats. The youngest and smallest of the group, Matthew Pierce, finished sixth in White Fleet (10 and under) and 29th overall while gaining valuable big-fleet experience.

Once again, Santa Barbara's "Team Opti Power" represented SBYC well!

Results
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