Strategies Emerge in Day 6. Pyewacket Legs it Out

The sixth day of the 2022 Pacific Cup arrives with the entire fleet now at sea, and the weather conditions continuing to normalize. As of this writing, the fleet remains dispersed, though almost all of the boats - north, south and everyone in between - are in modest pressure and beginning to make tracks to Hawaii.

Friday afternoon saw the final start of the 2022 Pacific Cup as the Alaska Airlines F Division got underway in picture-perfect conditions including breeze in the teens and brilliant sunny skies. After light air and dense fog during some of the earlier starts, the racers, spectators, and media/photo team were grateful for the positive turn in the weather. With big, fast boats and plenty of breeze, the final wave of starters crossed the line and sailed out under the Golden Gate and out of view seemingly in the blink of an eye.

Unsurprisingly, Roy Pat Disney’s turbo Volvo 70 Pyewacket 70 has left the rest of the Friday fleet in their dust and is already beginning to work through earlier fleets, making 13 knots as of this writing. An impressive machine and crew to say the least. Behind Pyewacket, Alan Lubber’s R/P 55 Zvi is making 11 knots, while Stu Dahlgren’s Santa Cruz 70 Westerly, David Raney’s Wylie 70 Rage and Peter McCarthy’s TP 52 Shadow II are more closely grouped and averaging 10 knots as of this writing.

As many followers are aware, Peter Askew’s Volvo 70 Wizard retired a few days before the start with keel head issues. Unfortunately, Steven Johnson’s TP 52 Mist also pulled the plug shortly before the start after the team discovered damage in the bow of their yacht, presumably from a delivery-related collision. We will wish Wizard good luck and safe travels en route to Australia for this year’s Sydney - Hobart race, and we wish Mist a safe passage back to the Northwest, and we hope to see them again next time!

The Thursday fleets are continuing to provide fantastic racing action as the BMW of San Rafael and the Goslings Rum Divisions are beginning to spread out a bit and lay their cards on the table, from a navigational perspective. One of the most exciting of the Thursday battles is that of the three J/125’s, After being glued to each other for about 24 hours, Rufus Sjoberg and his J/125 Rufless - navigated by renowned navigator Skip McCormack - have made a move to the south. Jason Andrews and Shawn Dougherty’s J/125 Hamachi remains about 25 miles to the north of Rufless, and Zachary Anderson’s J/125 Velvet Hammer is another 20 miles north.

Michael Schoendorf’s Riptide 41 Blue is the furthest north boat in the Thursday fleet but slowed this morning as they work through some light air. Unlike the Monday and Tuesday starters, northerly pressure could work its way down and fill in for the Thursday and Friday starters, allowing them to sail a course closer to rhumb line (straight course on a chart, generally considered a neutral course for the Pac Cup), effectively cutting the corner on some rivals and sailing fewer miles, but at the same or even higher speeds than their opposition.

As of right now, the southernmost boats are looking best, but this will likely change as the weather scenario continues to play out. With conditions looking moderate for much of the race, we may soon see some of the slightly more displacement-oriented boats begin to correct out over their lighter, more planing-oriented boats that may not have enough breeze to get on the step and sail to their rating. While much of our coverage is focused on the fastest boats on course after a day or two, this focus will likely shift once we have enough data to derive how boats are actually sailing when compared to their rivals.

The plot has thickened significantly for the Monday and Tuesday starters as the breeze has now filled in, for almost all competitors, though some are still becalmed or nearly becalmed in localized wind holes that are forecast to dissipate soon. The boats hanging it out way up North, namely Rodney Pimentel’s Cal 40 Azure and Amanda and Brian Turner’s Beneteau 10R CruzSea Baby, as well as a handful of others, are surely relieved to be back in the breeze and moving along quickly after a challenging light-air struggle for the past few days. While they are moving along well, the fleet is entering the ‘Slot-Cars’ phase of the race as legendary navigator Stan Honey calls it, which will more or less slot competitors into the positions that they chose days ago. It’s notoriously difficult to get down in a downwind race, and that will likely play into the hands of the boats that played the south.

The husband/ wife duos onboard Raku and Foamy still continue to impress with their conviction and discipline to go south early, combined with consistently good boat speed. In the ‘middle’ group of Monday/ Tuesday starters, which is now the largest group on the course, breeze has filled and boats are back up to speed, though long-term ramifications of decisions made early in the race have yet to fully play themselves out. While many southerly boats have looked good since day one, and still continue to look good, it’s a long and grueling race and this major navigational split could still offer plenty of surprises further down the race track! Bottom line: this is a heck of an interesting race to follow, and it’s all still to play for in this long and challenging race, which will be largely defined by decisions made at the navigation table!

Kit Wegman’s Islander 36 Cassiopeia has made the decision to retire from the race and head back to port. Going slower than anticipated, the crew could foresee logistical, travel, work and food/water challenges, and has instead decided to pack it in and head home. All on board are safe, with no problems to report.

We have now started to make standings available, as well as a selection of the pithy, amusing, and illustrative comments from our sailors offshore. Find them all at our reference page at https://pacificcup.org/follow-race

Aloha,

Ronnie Simpson

Pacific Cup Yacht Club