The
Cutty Sark Regatta
The
Cutty Sark Regatta was an
annual event sponsored by the Cutty Sark Company; the one that makes the blended scotch
whiskey. They used the event for
promotional purposes by handing out visors and T-shirts. They provided the trophy. It was a beautiful, eight-inch, pewter
replica of the Cutty Sark
clipper ship. The first two, held in
1976 and 1977, were raced with Marbleheads. They were both won by a man named Henry
Morris from Delaware and his yellow Epic.
It was during the Jive Turkey race in 1977 that the club announced that
the third Cutty Sark
Regatta would be a two-day event and raced with 10 Raters. The following spring
it was announced that the race would double as the AMYA 10 Rater Annual Class
Championship Regatta also known as the 10 Rater ACCR.
On
the Thursday before the race, I went on a date.
I asked the girl if she would like to go sailing with me. She was disappointed when she found out that
it wasn’t a real boat. Even though I let
her sail it while I gave instructions, we never went out again.
At
the start of every race I stood on a raised portion of the curb at the edge of
the pond. This way none of the larger
adults could block my view for even a second.
My overall strategy was to stay out of traffic and control the middle of
the pond. At the end of the first day, I
had sailed six races. I had five
first-place finishes and one second. I
was in first place overall but I didn’t know by how much.
I
didn’t take a shower that night nor did I take one the next morning. I was
determined that whatever luck I had was going to stick to me like my shirt. My
strategy for the second day had to be different. At starts I found myself being crowded. This happens to the leader. I call it the
“I’m gonna hang with that guy” syndrome. Skippers
think they will do better if they do what the leader does and go where they go.
Most of the time all this does is produce a new leader. So my new strategy was
to determine who in the race was closest to me in the standings and cover
them. While I may not win that
particular race, I wouldn’t lose any ground in the standings. With five races
under my belt and one race to go, my Sunday finishes were one first-place
finish, three second-place finishes and a third.
Between
races, a good friend of mine at the club told me that a blind man wanted a good
look at the winning boat. He wanted my
permission before he let the man touch my boat.
I was thrilled. As I watched I wondered what he might have been
thinking. I answered any and all of his
questions. After about five minutes he said he could tell that I had a fast boat
and he wished me luck. I could sense the good karma circling me.
I
walked back to the scoring table to see who was closest to me in the standings
so I would know who to cover. I was
almost purple in anticipation for that final race. This is where I would routinely blow my lead
with unnecessary tacks, bad decisions, a missed mark, or a foul. I always managed to do something agonizingly
dumb. Then the woman who was keeping score
told me that my lead was such that there was no way I could lose, even if I
didn’t put my boat in the water again.
At
that moment I wondered if I was hungry so I bought a hot dog. I ate it too fast to taste it so I got
another one. It was about then that I
noticed that I was extremely grimy and I smelled like a swamp. The good karma that was circling me turned
out to be flies. I casually ended my racing day with a pedestrian third-place
finish in that final, meaningless race.
My
final score was 18.5 points. Carl Brosius finished second with around 30 points. Ned Wagner, an ace among Marblehead skippers,
came in third with his Epic. Dad
finished in fifth place with 35 points.
I was awarded the pewter Cutty Sark trophy, a plaque declaring me the 1978 10-Rater
national champion, and a hand-made lamp donated to the AMYA as a prize by a
fellow member. Afterward, I was
interviewed by a reporter from New York Magazine. She asked me what I thought was the biggest
factor in my victory. I told her it was
Jack Daniels and that I’m too young to drink.
That
night my mom invited some of my friends to the house to celebrate. I tried to have a good time but I was wiped
out. Later that week my parents were
contacted by Sports Illustrated. They wanted me to go to a studio in the city
to have my portrait taken, which I did. I still have the picture. They called later that week to do the
interview. Unfortunately they called
while I was watching The People’s Court on television so I wouldn’t come to the
phone. Mom did the interview for
me. Needless to say, they didn’t run any
articles. I was approached by my high
school newspaper. I requested that they
not run a story. Don’t confuse my quest
for anonymity with being modest. I
rubbed it in Dad’s face at every opportunity which by now,
had become the custom.
Here is an article about the race.
Continue on to A Day with Japanese Journalists.
