Orange Bowl – Day 1, December 27, 2009

This year’s annual Orange Bowl Regatta, held by Coral Reef YC and Biscayne Bay YC, was off to a light and shifty but very competitive start today. The breeze varied but remained below 8 knots, providing frustrating conditions for both the race committee and the competitors. Most classes only sailed one race so, as always, there is a lot of regatta still to come.

On the Laser course, the international sailors led the fleets. Canadian Ricardo Montemayor won the first and only race in full rigs while Ecuadorian Jonathan Martinetti won in the radials. In the smaller laser, the 4.7, Max Stein tops the standings.

Though the Opti class only sailed one race today as well, the young competitors seemed in good spirits. Cassie Oble at her first regatta in the Optimist was pleased with the racing and said it was “a good experience for her first event”. Currently, Arthur Fortune and Chris Williford hold the top spots with firsts in separate flights.

In the C420 class, Michael Dahl and Nicole Crice are winning from today’s two races. Alex Ramos, in 7^th place advocated “playing the shifts and having a good start”. It seemed that being caught behind the fleet off the start was not the best of plans in today’s light breeze.

This year, a brand new class has been added to the regatta, the international 420. Despite the last minute notice, the class is extremely competitive. Many of the top sailors who previously sailed in the club 420 class have made the switch to the faster and lighter boats, so the racing is very tight. With the two races sailed today, two girl skippers have taken the top places in the standings led by Georgie Ryan and Haley Kirk, a team who began the regatta today with two bullets. Several other I420 sailors I spoke to look forward to more breeze as we move into tomorrow which is probably a sentiment shared by the majority of the people here. Wish for breeze for us!

Amanda Salvesen

Results:

http://www.coralreefyachtclub.org/index.cfm?menu=7560

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