Verve Cup Inshore Regatta at Chicago Yacht Club - Day 1
by Rachelle Treiber 25 Aug 2013 07:14 BST
24-25 August 2013
Solid breeze brings a great day of sailing for day one of the Verve Cup Inshore Regatta
More wind predicted for Sunday's final day of racing at Chicago Yacht Club's Belmont Station
After several days of light winds in the Chicago area a solid southeast breeze of 8 - 12 knots got the first day of racing off to a great start in the Verve Cup Inshore Regatta.
"This was a great day to go sailing - a 'Chamber of Commerce' day for the racers," said Circle A Race Officer Janet Baxter.
The annual regatta features two days of the best one-design sailing in the Midwest and brings over 300 racers and guests to the Chicago Yacht Club's Belmont Station.
Identical classes will compete to determine which boat has the best skipper and crew. Laser, Vanguard 15, Melges 24, Etchells, Shields, Luders 16, Colgate 26, Rhodes 19, Solings, J/70s and J/24 keelboat classes will take part this year.
This year 86 boats registered, including an impressive 20 boats from the United States and Europe in the J/70 fleet in its first year at Verve Inshore.
After three races Joel Ronning's Catapult led the J/70s by four points. Ronning is a member of the Wayzata Yacht Club in Minneapolis, MN.
Chicago Yacht Club member John Heaton, owner/skipper of the J/70 Empeiria, said he was excited to race in the first major event in Chicago for the less than two-year-old J/70 class. "This is a nice, fast, small keelboat," said Heaton, of Wilmette, IL. "Anyone can sail it. It's a lot of fun. We had good winds today and we are hoping we will get going fast downwind tomorrow."
This year also marked the debut of the Colgate 26 fleet to the course. After 3 races Chicagoan Nicholas Petrovits' Recess was leading its four-boat section by four points.
Circle B had solid racing finishing seven races for the V15 class and five races each for the R19s and Lasers, according to Race Officer Lynn Lynch.
"The wind built and went left early settling in to a 120-degree heading for the second half of the day. It was a steady flow of starts and finishes as the three fleets went around the courses," Lynch said.
Today's results can be found here.
Winds are expected to be even better - as high as 15 knots - for tomorrow's final day of Verve Cup Inshore racing, which begins at 10:30 a.m. CST.
Thank you to our co-sponsors Audi and SLAM, as well as Boston Beer, Karma Yacht Sales, Mount Gay Rum, and West Marine.