I’ve been away from the Bay Area sailing in Turkey, and returned just in time for an amazing weekend: Fleet Week, the Castro Street Fair, the Cal and Stanford games, the A’s and the Giants in the playoffs, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass in Golden Gate Park, the Blue Angels in the air, the Columbus Day Parade in North Beach, and the America’s Cup World Series on the Bay. It was quite a weekend, and there was something for everyone! For me, it was those 45-foot catamarans racing in the America’s Cup World Series.
The Formula 40 catamaran at the Bozburun Yacht Club in Turkey bares a striking resemblance to the AC45 boats that have been competing in the America’s Cup World Series on San Francisco Bay. Photo by Anthony Sandberg
By CaptaIn Ray
Published: November, 2012
I’ve been away from the Bay Area sailing in Turkey, and returned just in time for an amazing weekend: Fleet Week, the Castro Street Fair, the Cal and Stanford games, the A’s and the Giants in the playoffs, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass in Golden Gate Park, the Blue Angels in the air, the Columbus Day Parade in North Beach, and the America’s Cup World Series on the Bay. It was quite a weekend, and there was something for everyone! For me, it was those 45-foot catamarans racing in the America’s Cup World Series.
One of our stops in Turkey had been the Bozburun Yacht Club (BYC), which has among its fleet of boats a Formula 40 catamaran. Athem, the owner of the yacht club, told us this was the very same cat Pierce Brosnan was seen sailing (and flipping) in the 1999 remake of The Thomas Crown Affair. She had also been owned by often-outspoken three-time Cup competitor for Tom Blackaller. Tom died, much too early, in 1989 at the age of 49. However, in the mid 1980s Tom had opined that he would like to see America’s Cup races on 40-foot catamarans. Although it took 25 years, it seems appropriate that his wisdom is being recognized here on San Francisco Bay.
On the second day of our stay at the BYC, Athem took a group of us for a sail on the cat. The combination of smooth water and steady wind was a perfect scenario for performance. The boat was like a flying carpet, racing across the surface of the sea. The light wind chop had no effect on the boat’s speed or solidness in any way. Mostly, it created some spray that blew as a salty mist into my face and stung my eyes, but that was all. Occasionally, a sheet of solid water would fly off the windward bow and soak me thoroughly, but the sea temperature must have been about 84 degrees Fahrenheit. And who cared? I was flying across Bozburun Bay on a cat that was a direct ancestor to the America’s Cup boats we all saw racing on San Francisco Bay just a few weeks ago!
I have learned over the years to estimate boat speed by watching the water flow past the boat. With experience and practice, this technique can be quite accurate. But this boat’s speed was so far outside of my range of experience that I had no idea how fast we were really going. Any number I came up with would have just been a guess, and not a very good one.
So I said to Athem, "I usually sail monohulls and this speed is way outside my experience. How fast are we going?" He tweaked the boat a little, the windward hull lifted a few feet out of the water and said with a big grin, "I sail monohulls too, just differently. We’re doing about 25 knots!"
Ray Wichmann, is a US SAILING-certified Ocean Passagemaking Instructor, a US SAILING Instructor Trainer, and a member of US SAILING’s National Faculty. He holds a 100-Ton Master’s License, was a charter skipper in Hawai’i for 15 years, and has sailed on both coasts of the United States, in Mexico, the Caribbean, and Greece. He is presently employed as the Master Instructor at OCSC Sailing in the Berkeley Marina.
