Nightime Piloting aboard Growler and Liberator

The Midshipman Waterfront Officers have expanded on last years "Winter Waterfront Operations" series to include summer and fall training opportunities. The program kicked off last night with the first of two nighttime navigation and piloting trips in the East River aboard Growler and Liberator. The program is designed to both introduce the plebe class to more advanced ship handling and navigation, as well as to reinforce the skills of upperclassmen who will be returning to sea.

KP Alumni David Wright '04 in Sixth Place at Laser World Championships

Kings Point Dinghy Team Alumni David Wright is in 6th place of 164 sailors at the 2009 Laser World Championships. Follow the Action Here!

Taking Vanquish for a Spin

Captain Misty at the helm- Not sure what Phil's doing on the main sheet...

KP Dinghy Team Wins Vermont Laser Open

From Nick Aswad '11-- Nick doesn't mention in his write up that he won the event....

For our first regatta of the season, the KP Dinghy team trekked up to my home club, the Malletts Bay Boat Club, for the Vermont Laser Open. With a great weather forecast for the entire weekend, we were all pretty psyched to get out on Lake Champlain and for a little non-collegiate Laser sailing. After hassling all of the local Laser sailors for their spare sails (since ours aren’t exactly street legal), we made it out to the race course. There was a good turn out with close to 30 full rigs and 4 radials on the starting line. Unfortunately, the wind was light, and it was HOT. We floated around for an hour or so, roasting in the sun and seeing who could do the best front-flip capsizes. Together, Dan and Chris won this fierce competition.
After a while the breeze finally picked up to about 5 knots and we got 3 races off. An out of town sailor took the first bullet, I took the second, and Casey Gilmore, who just started skippering, and has never sailed lasers before, shocked everyone when he came screaming into the finish on a nice left shift and snagged a bullet in the final race of the day. When we got ashore, the race organizers put on a great regatta/birthday dinner for all of the racers and helpers.
Sunday was looking a little more promising with the wind blowing about 10 knots during the first 2 legs of the first race; but it didn’t hold up and we sailed 3 races in the same breeze that we had on Saturday. It got pretty light at times and some serious roll-gybing was required to make it on the downwind legs. Our results were up and down in the shifty light air, but when the day was over we all managed to look good in the standings. Chris would have finished about 5 places higher; but after crossing the finish line first in the last race, he found out that he was OCS, (despite what the results say, we still considered it a victory). Overall we all thought that the regatta was awesome way to start the year. Everyone was happy to have the KP sailing team racing at the regatta and asked that we make this an annual event for our team.

Training and Tuna

The About Face crew left the dock at 1600 Friday afternoon in search of the Bigeye Tuna which recent reports indicated were being caught. 13 hours later we arrived 115 miles offshore at the East Wall of the Hudson Canyon and had 9 lines in the water before sunrise. As the sun came over the horizon we were greeted by another 80 boats who had the same intentions of finding big fish. Our initial plans were to stay out of the fleet which was working a 3 square mile area and try to find our own fish. It turned out to be a slow morning and at 1100 the crew made the call to join the fleet as it sounded like a few of the boats were finding fish. The first hour in the fleet was rather hectic weaving in and out of boats trying to keep lines from getting tangled. At 1200 the decision paid off and 3 rods went off and we could immediately tell these were big fish. We broke off one fish immediately but crew members Scott McCormick 10’ and Russ Barber settled in for the long battle with the remaining to fish. An hour and forty five minutes later the first fish came in the boat and was a 150lb bigeye tuna. The other fish was nowhere near ready to come in the boat and almost took all the line off the reel forcing us to ditch the rod overboard connected to another rod. We finally got the rod back in the boat but 10 minutes later the rod broke in half. We were forced to cut the line and splice it onto another rod to avoid breaking off the fish. After a total of 3 hours ten minutes the hook pulled on the fish 20 ft under the boat. The crew quickly reset lines hoping to find a few more fish in the evening and were able to hook up on 2 small yellowfin tuna and a nice white marlin before dark which was released. After a slow night Saturday we were up on the troll by 0445 and the first red went off in the dark at 0500. Pete Kaple 11’ was on the rod and after 2 hours we boated another Bigeye tuna weighing in at 200lbs. We pulled lines at 0900 and headed for KP and arrived at school at 1800. The 383nm round trip was a great way for the crew to review their skills in small vessel safety, route planning, watch standing, and terrestrial and electronic navigation before leaving for sea in November. The 6 person crew consisted of Jordan Musselman 10’, Scott McCormick 10’, Mike Burbelo 10’, Peter Kaple 11’, Mike Zubrick 11’, and Mr. Chris Barber.

US Match Racing Semi-Finals Report

USMMA Sailing hosted the USMRC Semi-finals for the National Championship in Sonars this weekend.  Racing in the event is Coach Rick Dominique with crew Jonathan Siener/ Ed Stacy ‘10 and midshipman Joseph Hoffman ‘11.  On Saturday, in very light and trying conditions, PRO Paul Nardone completed three flights of the first round-robin.  Our Kings Point team lost their first two races, then won their final one.

 

On Sunday, the remainder of round-robin was completed.  Conditions continued to be light, though less shifty.  The standings at the end of the round-robin are:

1-       7 wins - 0 losses: Taylor Canfield, St. Thomas, USVI

2-       5 wins - 2 loss:  Jon Singsen,

3-       5 wins - 2 losses:  Ginny Worcester, Fairfield, CT

4-       3 wins - 4 losses:  Paul Wilson, New York, NY

5-       3 wins - 4 losses:  Rick Dominique, USMMA

6-       3 wins - 4 losses:  Neily Williamson, Oyster Bay, NY

7-       2 wins - 5 losses:  Leo Vassilev, Oyster Bay, NY

8-       0 win - 6 losses:  Dan Wittig, Annapolis, MD

 

The top four boats proceeded to the best-of-three Semi-Finals where Canfield’s team (1) defeated Wilson’s team (4), and Singsen’s team (2) defeated Worcester’s team (3).  The boats in positions 5-8 sailed a sudden-death elimination to determine their final position for the regatta.  Dominique’s team (5) defeated Williamson’s team (6) to remain in fifth.  Wittig’s team (8) defeated Vassilev’s team (7) for the only position change.

 

In the best-of-three Finals, Paul Wilson defeated Ginny Worchester 2-0 to claim third overall.  Taylor Canfield defeated Jon Singsen 2-0 to claim first overall, with Singsen second.  The top two finishers will be invited to participate in the USMRC National Championship in St. Petersburg this November.

 

Special thanks to Paul Nardone (PRO), Bruce Cook, the National Chairman of the USMRC and all the umpires for giving of their time to make this event possible.  Also special thanks to the midshipmen at USMMA and Ronnie Saccardo for their efforts to prepare for and host a great event.

 

Link to photos by Natalie here.

Kings Pointer Ready to Leave Shipyard

The Kings Pointer has nearly completed her maintenance period at the North Florida Shipyard in Jaxsonville. In addition to bottom cleaning, painting, and regulatory requirements she had main engine work completed. She should be home at Kings Point next week.

Seabreeze

Have to love the KP seabreeze- hot and sticky with no wind till 1600- and then sailing time!

Pics and Video Here!

Eric Horrocks '11 at E-Scow Eastern Champs

From Eric Horrocks at the E-Scow Eastern Championships in Mantoloking, NJ.

First Day

Hey,

Well today was the first day of sailing and it went really well. We took some good pictures with the burgee up and I cant send them because I can't seem to get them off the my camra. Anyway it was about 5-10 mph and choppy. The first race we had a 7 I think. It was very light but we pulled through. The second race went really well. We rounded the first mark 5th then down wind lost a little but came out with an 8. We are very pround with how we are doing and are showing off the KP burgee as much as possible. Tomorrow its going to be windy and we are pumped. I will email you tomorrow with a update and some pictures.

Eric

Second Day

Well today went really well it was blowing 10 to 15, we had a 13 in the first race thats wasn't to good but we were happy with it. The second race we won. We started at the pin and port tacked the whole fleet. It was the coolest feeling inn the world being able to see the whole fleet in your window. The final race today was a 15 but overall we are tied for 5th with some racing left tomorrow so we are very pumped. Here is a website that has a ton of pictures from yesturday and some of today. Our sail number is LA-12 we are wearing the bright neon colors.

Eric

LINK TO PICS!

Defiance Wins Harbor Springs Regatta

Defiance finished the four race Harbor Springs Regatta on Lake Michigan with three straight 1sts.  The windy regatta had some great action, and was a great finish for the summer of sailing on the Great Lakes.