Isla Navidad
Class A - Start
Photos and story by Rich Roberts
 |
| Doug Baker drives Magnitude across
the starting line. Zephyrus V hit the middle of the line,
while Medicine Man (under boom at right) was first to
cross at the pin. |
LONG BEACH---The prospect of good winds
had brightened Friday when the three biggest and baddest boats
in the Long Beach/Newport Harbor Yacht Clubs' inaugural race
to Isla Navidad took off after eight earlier starters.
There was a 6-knot southwesterly breeze and reports of more
wind down the course as Bob McNeil drove his new Reichel/Pugh
maxZ86, Zephyrus V, across the line between Doug Baker's Andrews
70 turbo sled, Magnitude, at the committee boat and pharmacist
Bob Lane's Andrews 61, Medicine Man, at the pin. All were
cracked off slightly on a close beam reach as they disappeared
into the haze shrouding a cluster of container ships parked
off the coast in the ongoing port labor dispute.
When they started they were about 200 miles behind the two
Class D boats that started Wednesday and 120 miles behind
the six Class B and C boats that went Thursday. Paul Stemler's
J/44, Patriot, led the former, while David Janes's J-Bird
III and Mike Campbell's Victoria V were neck and neck in the
latter group in a match race between Transpac 52s.
 |
| Zephyrus V, a maxZ86, casts a
big shadow over the 61-foot Medicine Man as they power
off the start. |
The race is 1,175 nautical miles, the
longest of the Mexican races from Southern California. Isla
Navidad is near Manzanillo on the Mexican mainland.
Zephyrus V, the first of a new ocean racing class, won last
summer's West Marine Pacific Cup in its maiden race. Magnitude
and Medicine Man finished 1-2 in last April's record-breaking
Tommy Bahama Newport to Ensenada Race.
Zephyrus V, with a 17-man professional crew, it is the favorite
to finish first, especially since it enjoyed decent breeze
from the start. The Transpac 52s had sailed only 112 miles
at an average speed of 3.8 knots before Friday morning's position
reports, but Patriot and Craig Reynolds' Olson 40, Bolt, were
into 12 knots of winds from 280 degrees in flat seas past
the international border.
 |
| Zephyrus V is the first of a
new class of maxZ86 designs by Reichel/Pugh of San Diego. |
The time limit for an official finish
is next Friday at 5 p.m.
