A R T I C L E S

Condordia in front of the
Golden Gate Bridge

LongPac start in light airs

Wing-on-wing aboard Wisdom
 in thick fog and light wind

Steve Saul, skipper of the Tartan 35,
 "Time Out" at the start

There and Back Again
by Alan Hebert

LongPac Race 2003

The Singlehanded Sailing Society sponsors a whole season of racing events on San Francisco Bay and in the Gulf of the Farallones every year, but most sailors probably only know of one of our events, namely, The Singlehanded TransPac. However, every other summer; the “off years” from the TransPac, the SSS runs a 400 mile offshore race that doesn’t get as much press. It’s called the Great Pacific Longitude Race, more affectionately known as the “LongPac”. The course is unusual. The race starts off the Golden Gate Yacht Club on the San Francisco Cityfront and heads out to any point on longitude 126 degrees, 40 minutes, west. When you get there you turn around and race back to San Francisco. This is a race that makes no sense, as described by Dwight Odom, past Commodore of the SSS.

“You race 200 miles off the coast. It’s windy and it’s cold. You’re in shipping traffic all the way out. Then, when you get out to just where it’s going to get a little bit easier, what do you do? You turn around and sail right back through it all again!”

Most racers use the LongPac as a qualifier for the next years Singlehanded TransPac, but there’s a small, hardcore bunch that comes back over and over, just because they love this race. The 2003 edition saw some extremes in terms of experience. Three racers this year had Singlehanded TransPacs under their belt, and one had a non-race solo transpacific passage (that’s me, Alan on “Wisdom”). Two had Mexico cruising experience. In contrast to that, one racer counted the LongPac as his second race, ever! Two more called the LongPac their third race, and one Moore 24 racer had never hoisted a spinnaker, solo, until he made the turnaround, 200 miles out! The 2003 LongPac was the biggest LongPac in many years, with 23 boats in singlehanded and doublehanded divisions hitting the line on Wednesday, June 25th.

Let’s hear the story of the race in the words of the racers who took part:

From Rob Macfarlane, singlehanded on “Tiger Beetle”, Nelson Marek 45:

“Wednesday was fabulous reaching conditions, 13-15 knot light breeze, warm, mellow seas, cruising along under no. 2 and full main carrying 7-9 knots boatspeed. Auspice (ed. note: Auspice was in the doublehanded class with Jim and Brian Coggan aboard) took the lead and carried the northern front, the southern contingent lead by Alchera and Tiger Beetle.

Thursday morning had Alchera and Tiger Beetle match racing along the course, side by side. 200 miles into the race we hit the rounding at the specified longitude at the same minute - fantastic racing! Despite the disparate designs neither boat could walk on the other.

(Ed. note: Tiger Beetle is a 45-foot Nelson Marek two-tonner, Alchera is a J-120)

Thursday evening was cold, thermal underwear (tops and bottoms) were in order, the fleet working west. We had a couple hours where the northwest swell met up with something out of the south and it got lumpy, same breeze and the fleet moving fast. Amazing stars away from the San Francisco city lights, milky way out in force, planets here and there and shooting stars blazing through the sky.”

From Alan Hebert, singlehanded aboard “Wisdom”, Santana 3030:

“The first two days were great....just fabulous, wonderful sailing in 10-15 knots. The wind was moderate, the seas weren't big, it was fast and I loved every minute of it. As Jim on “Auspice” said during one of the radio check-in’s “Don’t tell anyone about how good this is, or everybody will be out here!”. That was about right! The stars were beautiful at night and I never got tired. I took lots of naps during the mornings and stuck to my 20-minute snatches of sleep-routine at night, supplemented with 90 minutes of uninterrupted sleep between 1:00 and 2:30 AM. I hooked up the autopilot to steer the boat, but I never actually turned it on. I just locked down the tiller and the boat steered herself for almost two days, about ten degrees below close-hauled! The radio check-ins in the VHF were good fun. It’s nice to know how everyone else is doing. Great Stuff!”

From Mark Moore, singlehanded on the Moore 24, “No Name Moore”:

“I saw one chap out at the invisible line, but for the most part I had no idea on how the rest of the fleet were doing; meaning how I was doing. The Moore 24 stick is short, hence I had crappy radio after the first radio call in. This is my first overnight race, offshore race, third sailing race ... you've got the idea.

However, I felt settled and played with the boat more and more as time went on. Changed sails a bit, reefed/unreefed the main; jib out, jib in, etc. I sailed by speed indicator, not course. When I bounced around on the water, I fell off to keep up speed. All in all I sailed, sailed and sailed, and had a great time, even though self doubt surrounded me most of the time and I was ALONE. 37 - 15.5' N, is that too low?

Anyhow, considering myself as a danger to myself given the lack of sailing experience and knowledge, I was proud and happy with myself given the pretty good start and first day and a half of sailing....”

You get the idea! A good time was had by all on the way out to the turnaround point; anywhere on the line of longitude at 126 degrees, 40 minutes. Things changed on the way back in. One word summarizes it all. FOG!

From Steve Saul, singlehanded on the Tartan 35, “Time Out”:

"As a novice Longpac participant, the race produced so many experiences and stories, but the most interesting part of the trip for me was the return from the Farallon Islands on Saturday evening. As Time Out was escorted by a pod of three whales ten miles west of the islands, my first concern of approaching the Farallones in fog was allayed as I could clearly see the first hundred feet of the islands under the fog layer. As I got closer to round the islands and make my approach to the SF approach buoy, the fog closed in and visibility was less than ¼ mile.

After a day of light winds under 10 knots, the breeze filled in after the islands and Time Out was doing 5 knots toward the destination. At 11:30 PM, I passed the SF Approach Buoy. It’s hard to miss even in the thick fog with its powerful strobe light and horn. With visibility down, I called Vessel Traffic Service to ask the status of commercial ship traffic in and out of the ship channel and the bay. I had never done this before, but thought that caution was best given the conditions. They responded immediately with information about a container ship leaving the bay bound for sea using the south side of the shipping channel and a dredge in operation in mid channel. Also a tug and barge outbound from Pt. Bonita. It’s the middle of the night and the ship channel is a busy place! I skirted the north side of the ship channel and watched the container ship slip by – the contrast in size between us amazing. His diesel engines matched against my jib and mainsail with 6 knots of wind from the beam…. I thought: I could be bug juice on his windshield and he probably wouldn’t notice the contact."

Everyone had to deal with the fog, and most had problems with lack of wind between the Farallones and the shipping channel.

Here’s Dirk Husselman, singlehanded aboard the C&C 110, Xpression:

"The most difficult part of the race was to be stuck without any wind at Duxbury reef for hours. I was sitting at my nav station with the radar guard set for 1 mile and my timer set for 10 minutes to take catnaps. I got very little sleep and it was very frustrating. I was telling myself it’s better to give up and motor in. Why? Because I was tired and my mind started to rationalize everything. I was telling myself that it was a beautiful trip and why bother about the last 5 miles and why take the risk to get too close to shore? I called Debbie on my cell phone to tell her I was thinking of quitting; to hear myself tell that to someone else probably made me realize what I was trying to do. I made some coffee to relax a little and to make the final decision. Then a little breeze came up (2-3 knots) and I forgot everything, jumped up to trim the sails and get the boat moving. The wind was building and I used my big chute to get the hell away from Duxbury reef!"

The race had its share of drama, and it’s share of hedonism!

Dirk Husselman wins the “Good Eating” award!

"Talking about eating… I had some good food on board , fresh chicken Caesar salad, toast with salmon filet. I made a big pot of spaghetti the day before and only had to heat it up and add fresh vegetables. I had a whole grilled chicken, used the wings as snacks during happy hour. Heineken and wings are great out at sea. Also had a bottle of red wine, but decided not to open it. I made fresh coffee (Starbucks) once a day and had fresh fruit with yogurt and whipped cream for desert. I can rough it if I have to but if I can eat good stuff I will."

Bill Merrick earns the “Good Humour Under Adversity” award:

"The most notable incident of my race occurred at 03:30 on Saturday after I'd gone to sleep about an hour before. I'd set the boat up on a heading of NE at about 3 to 4 knots and gone below. I was woken up by the boat's excessive heel and immediately recognized that we were moving at least at hull speed. My first reaction was elation that we were finally moving fast! I put on foulies and harness and went up on deck to discover that we were going fast but in the wrong direction, we were moving South at over 6 knots. I threw a reef in the main and started to reel in the genoa. I'd decided to take it all the way in to get the boat and myself settled down and thinking straight. The sail came in about a third of the way and stopped. I tried letting it back out and it wouldn't move. I tried a few tugs with the winch - still no go. This was not a good thing. I hooked up to the jackline and crawled forward. It was as dark as the bottom of a coal mine. Long story; short version: my spinnaker halyard had fouled the top of the roller furler. I spent three hours sitting on the front of the bow pulpit getting it straightened out and started sailing again at about 07:00."

Alan Hebert wins the “Bubble Gum and Duct Tape” Award

"I had a bit of a structural emergency that gave me a good fright early on the second morning. The fibreglass tabbing that holds the port, forward hull stiffening plywood in place had come loose from the hull. The forward hull panel was oilcanning in a good 4 inches every time we’d hit a wave! After I got over my fright and my initial thoughts that I’d have to turn around and pack it in, I got mad and said to myself “HELL if I’m gonna give up without at least trying to fix it!!” A mess of 5 minute epoxy, a bunch of self-threading screws and some scrap wood braced that back up, and an hour and a half later I was testing it out. It held just fine, in fact it might even been stronger than what was there originally. I was still in it."

Why do people do the LongPac? What do the racers think about it, after it’s over? What do we learn from doing the race? The answers are many.

From Allen Cooper, singlehanded aboard the Ericson 35, Krissy:

"The goal was to see how a long single handed passage went, to get the boat ready for Mexico and then decide how to do the HA-HA; a crowded boat with complex watches etc or double handed with me taking most of the overnight watches. I’ve done coastal passages but always splitting the watches with another experienced sailor."

From Tom Krase, singlehanded aboard the custom Wylie 33,  Constellation:

"I learned a few things on Constellation on the LongPac... it was by far my longest singlehanded trip to date. First was that I need to do a better job of managing my sleep, I did OK the first couple days but then was so tired at the Farallones on Saturday afternoon that it was too easy to talk myself into motoring in."

From Bill Merrick, singlehanded aboard Ergo, his Ericson 35:

"The race was my first blue-water experience and has given me a very new perspective on time, distance and sailing. The big lessons learned are that I really don't know how to sail a course - too many years of just going out and sailing the best point of sail for conditions. The second lesson is that I really need to learn how to sail off the wind in light to moderate conditions - again too many years of just having fun.

I want to thank Dominatrix for the best boat race I've ever had from the light bucket to the finish. We finished about two minutes apart.

It was a great experience and has ramped up my sailing interest by a factor of at least 100%.

Looking forward to the TransPac."

In summary, what’s it all about? The LongPac, like all SSS events, is a race, but these races are different from most of the races you’ll compete in. Things change when you’re on the boat by yourself, or with only one other person. It changes even more when you’re out on the ocean, alone. Dirk Husselman and Mark Deppe expressed it best.

Dirk Husselman aboard the C&C 110, Xpression:

"The best part of the race is that it is not a “race” when you are out there, nobody is keeping secrets and everyone shares that great offshore feeling. For me this was my biggest single-handed effort and I loved it. Everything felt very natural, the sleeping, eating, etc.

Cannot wait to do more offshore single-handed races! It was great to be surrounded by great skippers and the information they were willing to share to get prepared for races like this."

Mark Deppe aboard Alchera, his J-120:

"I've tried to explain to others about the bond that develops between singlehanded racers as the race goes on, but it's difficult to explain. It's really true that racing against each other takes a back seat, and somehow it turns into racing as a team against time and conditions or something else. No one holds back any information, even though it helps out your fellow competitor and could possibly directly result in him beating you in the end."

The LongPac - It’s There and Back again with 23 of your closest friends. The 2003 edition will go down as a great one.

Results at the Singlehanded Sailing Society web site: http://www.sfbaysss.org