Big Boat Series

Hey all, I know it’s a bit late, but the past month has been completely hectic. So now I’m going to catch up.

First off, let’s cover the St. Francis Big Boat Series.  I was fortunate enough to sail with a great group aboard a pretty new J/88.  This is a new and quickly growing fleet, and it was pretty cool to see four boats tied up along the same dock in Sausalito!  As most of the programs are new and still developing out full teams (a couple of the guys are doing a lot of shorthanded events), two of the owners joined forces to do this first Big Boat Series as a learning program.  And a third new owner who just took delivery of his own boat (too late to get ready for BBS) joined us for Friday.  So we had 2-3 J/88 owners aboard and shuffled crew around a bit.  I think the gang learned a ton and I was really impressed with the improvement.  It’s also fun to be a part of such an enthusiastic and cooperative fleet, and I expect great things.  Stay on the lookout for a J/88 clinic in SF  this winter or next Spring!

And a big shout-out to Gary Panariello on the other J/88 in the regatta:  backed by a J/World team from our Annapolis office, they had the boat pretty dialed and tied for second in class (lost the tie breaker to end up in third).

 

 

 

As you might guess from the above photos, it was a pretty mild BBS.  A couple of days had racing postponed waiting for the breeze to fill.  But the nice weather and fun racing made up for that, and the San Francisco wind machine did it’s thing enough to let us light up the J/88 a couple times.  Good stuff!

Ok, that’s the short version of the Big Boat Series….   next up:  the J/70 North Americans!

Wayne Zittel & the J/World Team