“Swiftsure” and our guys are moving along at 6.1 knots…not too bad with 39.1 miles to go! It doesn’t look like our guys will be joining us for dinner tonight though (or before bedtime?) We’re hoping they’ll show before 2:00 am.
20-Jul-09 – 12:56pm
101st Race to Mackinac – Mid Afternoon Race Update
Monday, July 20, 2009 (Mackinac Island, Mich.) — John West, owner of Tomorrow’s Sunshine, was all smiles as he turned in his finish card to the Race Committee just moments ago. Sunshine, was the fourth boat to finish early Monday afternoon among the other Cruising Division boats that have been the first to cross the finish by Round Island Lighthouse.
“We had such nice wind and this was the first time sailing in the cruising division that we really raced near other boats in our same section,” West explained. Following Sunshine’s Friday afternoon start, the crew was able to sail at full boat speed of 7.5-8 knots for nearly the first 24 hours of the race. “We reached Big Sable in record time for us,” Mike West added. Mike, son of John is Sunshine’s skipper. It was at Point Betsie where this crew experienced their first bout with the light winds that have plagued the rest of the fleet who started the race on Saturday. “They didn’t nickname it ‘Beastie’ for nothing,” navigator Guy Demesy explained. “We sat there for 8-12 hours looking at a light blinking in the dark.” Other than the great winds, the most heart pounding moment for Demesy, who was helming for the last 4 nautical miles, was where he had to time a tack narrowly missing a tanker that was coming through at the same time right before the finish.
The Race Committee is expecting non-stop finishers all night into tomorrow as the rest of the fleet sails under the Bridge and to the finish. See cycracetomackinac.com for preliminary results and more race updates.