Contestants in the New York YC Race Week have enjoyed two perfect days of sailing in the waters of Rhode Island Sound and the cream is rising to the top. While some results are as expected, there have been some surprises. In the IMS 40 class, the two top boats going into racing Sunday took each other out in a port/starboard incident in the first race of the day. Steve Loeb’s Tripp 43 Sirena and Blair Brown’s Sforzando collided while approaching a weather mark, resulting in a few minor injuries and some major boat damage.
With both boats unable to finish that race or start the next, Bob Bayer’s ILC 40 More War Stories goes into Monday’s racing with a 3-point lead over Scott Weisman’s Pterodactyl.
In PHRF Class 2, Brian Cunha’s Tripp 47 Irie is winning a first-place tiebreaker with Tim Woodhouse’s Thompson 35 Rumours. Bringing up the rear in this three boat class is Stars and Stripes. Even with Dennis Conner joining the R/P 50 for Sunday’s two races, Stars and Stripes was unable to correct out against Irie and Rumours.
In the IMS racing class, Carrera, a Carroll Marine 60 owned by Joseph Dockery of Stamford, Conn., broke a tie with Idler, George David’s N/M IMS 50. With two bullets Sunday, Carrera takes a three and a half point lead. An over early call in Sunday’s second race meant that Idler‘s crew had to claw their way through the class during the six-leg race.
Edgar Cato’s Hissar has what looks to be a lock on the 2-boat 12-Meter class, beating Fred Van Liew’s Fiddler handily in the three races that they’ve sailed together. Fiddler was a DNC in the first race due to equipment problems and hasn’t been able to get up to pace since.
Chris Bouzaid’s Thompson 30 Wairere is winning PHRF Class 4 but the Evelyn 42 Hooligan, owned by Peter Brinckerhoff is nipping at the sportboat’s heels, and is only 2.75 points behind.
On the Green Fleet circle, David Brodsky’s Swan 55 Odyssey has climbed to first place in PHRF Class 1with a steady string of second-place finishes but Ted Naughton’s Fast 40 Different Drummer, which started out hot on Saturday with two wins, is only a point and a half behind. In PHRF 2, Mort Weintraub’s Troubador, an Express 37 is first by two points over the John Downey’s Frers 41 Gambler. PHRF 3 is topped by the Swan 44 Vixen, sailed by John and Bunny Wayt. In PHRF 4, it’s a clash of two top J/29s, as the Esposito’s Hustler tries to get back on top of sistership Dirty Harry, which leads the class by 3/4 of a point.
There are three races left in this seven-race series, and with good breezes forecast for Monday and Tuesday, therell be plenty of opportunities for competitors to better their positions. The seasons first tropical depression is 180 miles of Cape Hatteras Monday morning but forecasters are saying that the only influence it will have on the fleet will be a strengthening of a forecasted Northwesterly breeze for Tuesdays racing. If the wind does turn to the northwest it may see the race committee put the fleets into Narragansett Bay for the final day of racing.
