Cal Maritime Sailing

NORTH 1 & 2 at CSUMB

North 1 began with light wind ranging from 4-8 knots. Our Varsity A team which consisted of Paige Johnston 09’ & Jessica Schember 12’ took the first two bullets. Varsity A then consistently kept their boat in the top 3 positions for the rest of the day. Our JV A Sean Kelly 12’ & Allison Jolls 09’ began with two mid fleet races, then picked it up and got a bullet, a second, and a forth. These two teams combined won North 1 beating Stanford. Our Varsity B team Cole Davis 10’ & John Gray 11’ along with JV B team Sebastien Laleau 10’ & Bernard Bove ’12 together finished the day in second right behind Stanford.

North 2 was rainy and another light wind day which picked up with some nice 12 knot puff by the end of the day. Both Varsity A and JV A finished all but one race in the top fives, finishing one point shy of Stanford at the end of the day. Varsity B and JV B had a harder time sticking close to Stanford and their light crew boats finishing 4^th and 5^th at the end of the day. Races 2 and 3 were the hardest races for all teams with a couple 180 degree wind shifts through out the course and lighter wind.

SINGLE-HANDED NATIONALS

Over the weekend of October 24^th through the 26^th, Cal Maritime Sailing sent two Keelhaulers back to Ithaca, New York, one to compete in the 2008 ICSA/Laser Performance Men’s National Single-handed Championship hosted by Cornell University and the other as his coach. The invitation to compete in this event was sparked from a second place finish in the Pacific Coast Championships held in Mission Bay over the weekend of September 27^th and 28^th. During that event, senior Paige Johnston won a tie breaker over freshman Sean Kelly.

Back in New York, the conditions included winds variable from 25 knots to completely nil, air temperatures ranging in the low 30’s to low 40’s, and scattered showers appearing throughout the weekend, on top of the fierce competition of 18 of the top college sailors in the nation. With this high level of competition, consistency proved quite difficult to maintain. By Saturday, Paige had found his footing, and had pulled off a nearly perfect race, finishing seconds behind the regatta winner in second place in the tenth race. On Sunday, Paige came out strong once again, and after a tough finish in race fourteen, pulled off yet another second place finish. With an average score of tenth place over 18 total races, Paige tied for eleventh place overall with TJ Tullo, a senior from Stanford University. Unfortunately, TJ had beaten Paige in three more races out of the 18, giving him the advantage. Paige finished in a respectable 12^th place, representing Cal Maritime for the first time in a dinghy national championship.

Congratulations to Paige and his coach Ty Reed, on their achievement at this high ranking event!

SINGLE-HANDED PCCs

The scene was set perfectly for the 2008 Single-handed Pacific Coast Championships hosted by UC San Diego through the Mission Bay Yacht Club over the weekend of September 26-28. The winds were a solid 8-12 knots throughout the weekend, the sun was frequently peering through the well known Southern California marine layer, and the temperature was perfect. This year, as the team has been steadily building its roster, six Cal Maritime sailors were sent to race lasers in this pinnacle event for college single-handed racing on the west coast: Kayla D’Ambrosi (’12) and Katie Love (’12) in the women’s division and Sean Kelly (’11) Michael Kraft (’12), Brian Vanderspek (’10), and Paige Johnston (’09). For the women’s event, one day of racing was completed, resulting in 12 races for 12 competitors. The Cal Maritime girls showed great improvement throughout the day and represented the university very well as Cal Maritime’s first women’s team in Sailing. Katie Love worked hard to the end, finishing strong with scores of a 4 and a 1 to round out her result to a respectable 8^th place in a group of excellent women’s sailors. Saturday gave the men a crack at the challenging winds of Mission Bay, CA, and after one day of racing and 15 races completed, the scores were amazingly tight, with the exception of Sean Kelly leading the pack of 25 sailors by about 20 points. Over the course of day two, however, consistency began to pay off as the race count ended at 25. Paige came back with multiple first place finishes, evening up the score with Sean, resulting in a tie for second place. In college sailing, the tiebreaker is decided based on who beat who more times throughout the event. As it turned out, Paige beat Sean 13 times to Sean’s 12, giving him the advantage, the second place, and the qualifying position to represent Cal Maritime in the 2008 Collegiate Single-handed National Championship at Cornell University in late October. Congratulations to the CMA Sailing Team and their esteemed coach, and fellow cadet, Ty Reed. Good luck in New York!