Thanks to the generosity of DC Sail and the National Maritime Heritage Foundation we are able to offer a 3-hour spectator cruise (11:30-2:30 pm) aboard the schooner American Spirit on the Sunday of the President’s Cup Regatta for just $20/person. Click here for complete details on the cruise and click here to purchase tickets via the President’s Cup regatta website.
Also, remember that it is not too late to register for the 2015 PRSA President’s Cup Regatta!
The PRSA Fall Series starts this Sunday! Now is the time to make sure that you have your crew organized, that you have paid your PRSA dues, and that you have signed up for (or already fulfilled) your PRSA race committee obligations. Remember to review the Sunday Series NOR and Sailing Instructions as well. I look forward to seeing you on the water on Sunday!
The 2015 PRSA President’s Cup Regatta, sponsored by Annapolis Performance Sailing, will be held September 19 & 20 at Washington Sailing Marina, continuing the long tradition of competitive one-design racing started by the President’s Cup in 1934. The regatta will be sailed on the Potomac River on two courses. One-person dinghies (Lasers, El Toros, Penguins) will race on Saturday in the cove near Washington Sailing Marina (WSM) or off of the power plant just south of WSM. Other classes (Albacores, Buccaneers, Catamarans, Flying Scots, Lightnings, I-20s, etc.) will race Saturday and Sunday on the north course between Hains Point and Gravelly Point (with the Capitol and national monuments as a backdrop). Register now for the 2015 President’s Cup and view the NOR and other race information. Registration fees increase after September 12, so make sure to register and pay online before September 12 to save yourself a bit of cash!
Special thanks to Annapolis Performance Sailing for sponsoring the regatta and providing some additional prizes. This year we will also have a spectator boat – the schooner American Spirit – thanks to the generosity of DC Sail and the National Maritime Heritage Foundation! Make sure to tell your friends and family about this fantastic opportunity to view the sailing from the water on Sunday, Sept. 20.
I’m writing with a couple of important announcements about our fall racing schedule:
I’ve posted more details on these important changes below. Please don’t hesitate to contact your Executive Board if you have any questions.
PRSA is once again partnering with CalendarLink (http://www.calendarlink.org/prsa/home.html) to produce a 2016 tide calendar. These calendars show the actual tides predicted for the Potomac River at Washington National Airport on the Potomac River!
This year we are having a photo contest to select photos to include in the calendar. All PRSA members are encouraged to enter their very best photo. Each PRSA member may submit one photo for consideration. The winning photo will become the cover photo for the calendar and the winner will receive a FREE 2016 PRSA Calendar.
Here are the requirements for calendar photo submissions:
So get out there and start taking pictures! Then, figure out which one is your best picture and enter it into the contest. Email your photo to Jeff Neurauter (jmnsailor@yahoo.com) no later than November 1, 2015.
It is summer, so that means that it is Wednesday Night Sailing Season! Stroll down to Washington Sailing Marina and look for our PRSA sailors in the dock/crane area around 5:30 each Wednesday. If you’re new, simply introduce yourself! Wednesday night sailing is very informal, with short races in the cove and lots of fun/practice sailing. We rotate people in and out of boats right off the dock, so everybody gets to take a turn!
We had a beautiful day on the river with a 10-12 kt. southerly blowing steadily all day long. Will Phillippe and his RC crew set a nice long racecourse and gave the various classes a mixture of “T” and “W” courses. The great breeze meant that we finished 4 races in no time and I think most sailors were happy to head to shore to relax, stretch out, and enjoy a beverage with some BBQ after a great (but exhausting) day of sailing.
2015 Spring Series 6 – Buccaneers
2015 Spring Series 6 – Lightnings
2015 Spring Series 6 – Multihulls
Today was an awesome day on the water and the weather gave us exactly the opposite from last weekend. The breeze was out of the east/south east and was blowing around 16 most of the day. As is typical of an east wind, the conditions were quite puffy and shifty. The race committee set us up a triangle course and was able to get 5 races off (3 T2s and 2 O2s). The conditions gave us some nice long reaching legs that were quite fast at times. We had 3 Albacores, 2 Buccaneers, and 6 Lightnings and decided at the skippers meeting to just have everyone start together which provided fun races and competitive starts.
2015 Spring Series 2 – Albacores
The opening day of PRSA’s 2015 Spring Series arrived clear, blue and still: the river was glass smooth and only faint wisps of breeze out of the north were all that remained of the frontal winds from the day before. Race Committee PRO Jim Graham pulled everyone together for the skippers’ meeting at ten and announced a one hour delay, noting that we all had to be off the water for the PRSA BBQ scheduled to begin at 3PM. Four Lightnings were present– Frank Gallagher, Nabeel Alsalam, Bob Astrove, and Lindsay Bach– along with groups of three or four each of Albacores, Buccaneers and Interlake Scows. So everyone milled about for an hour or so when Jim came walking through the clusters of sailors blowing his whistle, announcing another one hour delay. About halfway through the second hour, Jim decided we should all splash and the RC would tow the boats up to the course. This took about about three quarters of an hour during which time the the scows dropped out. The wind was still mostly absent though the forecast was calling for the breeze to come up out of the South sometime around one o’clock. So the fleet drifted and bobbed for about another three-quarters of an hour in the luxurious sunshine until a faint southerly breeze of about 3 mph began to fill in, right on schedule, a little after 1:00 PM.
