Hurricane Irene Should Create Perfect RC Laser Conditions

Posted on August 27, 2011 by Bill Blevins

Bring your rain gear (but you probably won’t need it), a PFD and your RC Laser and join us Sunday, August 28, 2011 for a 2.5 mile race across Canandaigua Lake to a cookout held at Neil and Maggie Atkins house in Deep Run Cove. This race will count as one Fall Low Point Series race in Week 2 of the series so there will only be one “regular” race that day.

Weather forecasters at the moment are saying that we have a 61% chance of not seeing any rain but they are calling for steady winds of 18+ knots from the North with gusts much higher! Bring your “C” sails! (“D” sails if you’ve got ’em!) Thanks to Hurricane Irene, it’s shaping up to be perfect weather to run under sail SSE across the lake!

Nelson Habecker and Bill Blevins are going out early to check the sea state and set a finish line. Then we’ll all gathered at the concrete dock at the Canandaigua Yacht Club at 1 p.m. and figure out the chase boat situation and who is going in which boat and who is driving around. After that we’ll get on the water and prepare for an on the water start at about 1:30 p.m.

If the weather is just too rough, we’ll drive around the lake and park in the lot for Deep Run Cove park since most likely no one will be there swimming.

We’ll attempt running multiple races for the Women’s Series from the docks across the lake.

Don’t miss it! This is going to be a fun one!

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A Long Distance Race, Happy Hour, Cookout and Fall Racing!

Posted on August 22, 2011 by Bill Blevins

The Canandaigua RC Laser Fleet kicked off the final series of the 2011 season yesterday in very nice southerly winds which followed a serious afternoon downpour and thunderstorm. The skies cleared up just before race time and sailors completed five races and then one additional race in the Women’s Series.

The results have been updated and posted.

This new seven week series will take the fleet up through the Sunday before Sailor’s Night where we’ll hand out awards for our racing year which began back in 2010 with the Frostbite series!

On Friday August 26, the Canandaigua RC Laser Fleet will be helping host a happy hour at CYC from 6:30 – 9:30 p.m. The fleet will have boats set up for display with ‘B’ sails (since the big “A” sails are too tall for the indoor bar area) and be talking to people about our fleet activities and answering questions about RC Lasers. There will be plenty of fleet business cards to pass around. Bring a potential member to have a chance to win a gift basket. There will be live music, food and discounts on drinks at the bar.

On Sunday, August 28 the RC Laser fleet will be racing a few miles down and across Canandaigua Lake to a finish line set in front of Neil and Maggie Atkins house. We’ll set a starting line off the concrete dock at CYC and get going at 1:30 p.m.. We estimate that we’ll be finishing by 3 p.m. if the wind and waves cooperate. If you are racing, you will need to figure out your mode of transportation to chase your RC Laser across the lake – just don’t skip the event because you can’t find a ride – as we’ll figure out something before the start! The Women’s Series sailors are planning on holding as many races as they can across the lake from 3:30 – 5:30 p.m. which will then be followed by a cookout. There will be a couple of powerboats that will be available to make sure everyone gets transported back across the lake to the CYC.

Finally, the RC Laser National Sailing Championships are going to be held at the Rock Hall Yacht Club in Rock Hall, Maryland on September 17 – 18. Bill Blevins (#254) and Tracy will be attending. To register and for more information visit http://www.rclaser.org/.

To keep up with all of these events, keep an eye on the calendar section of this site and watch for emails this week for details about the happy hour and the race across the lake!

Get ready for a busy and fun weekend!

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Fun Fall RC Laser Season Planned

Posted on August 8, 2011 by Bill Blevins

After 31 races that included 207 total starts in the Summer Low Point Series, Bill Blevins (#254, above in photo) took home top honors, ending with 21 points. Gary Schmidt (#59) followed in second place with 49 points and David Turnbull’s (#17) series-long scores broke a tie with Nelson Habecker (#54) to take the third spot. They both had 57 net points.

There is no scheduled RC Laser fleet racing next weekend due to the 50th Ensign National Championship Regatta being held at the Canandaigua Yacht Club. The RC Lasers will resume racing with the start of the Fall Low Point Series as well as continuation of the Women’s Series on August 21 at 4 p.m.

Mark your calendars for Happy Hour at the Canandaigua Yacht Club on August 26, starting at 6:30 p.m. The Canandaigua RC Laser fleet is one of the sponsors of the event and we have the opportunity to set up our boats in the bar so people will be able to get up close and check them out and ask questions. “Out of the Blue” will be performing from 6:30 until 9:30 p.m. Bring a potential new member with you for a chance to win a gift basket.

Sunday, August 28 is going to be a BIG day! Fall Low Point Series Race Week #2 will start at CYC at 1:30 p.m. with the finish line set 2.4 nautical miles down Canandaigua Lake on the East shore at Neil and Maggie’s house! Neil and Maggie have offered to host a cookout for the fleet! We are also going to carry over marks so the ladies can see how many races they can get in that afternoon for the Women’s Series! It should be a fun day. We’ll need a few “real” boats to ferry the racers across the lake. More detailed plans will be communicated shortly.

If you haven’t signed up for the RC Laser North American Championship to be held at the Rock Hall Yacht Club in Maryland on Sept. 17 & 18 but you still want to participate, you should register immediately as they will be closing the process when they reach 40 boats. Visit http://www.rclaser.org for all of the information and to register online. Bill and Tracy Blevins (#254) will be attending.

Finally, the current American Model Yacht Association’s (AMYA) quarterly magazine has a nice write-up on the activities of RC Laser fleets from around the country. This issue mentions our season long Women’s Series and includes results and a race summary of our Squaw Island Race. Since several of our fleet members have joined, we are now officially AMYA fleet #315. If you’d like to support the AMYA, visit http://theamya.org to sign up. The magazine they put out is first-rate and is packed with information on all types of model sailboats as well as information on upcoming regattas and previous results.

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RC Lasers Sponsor Aug. 26th Happy Hour At CYC

Posted on July 27, 2011 by Bill Blevins

Nelson Habecker, Jack Bennett and Bill Blevins, left to right in the photo above, started racing radio controlled Laser sailboats down on the waterfront docks in July of 2010.

One year has passed and the RC Laser fleet has now grown to 12 boats!

Current RC Laser sailors are Neil Atkins, Maggie Atkins, Jack Bennett, Bill Blevins, Kieran Draper, Jonathan Gorbold, Nelson Habecker, Dave Kelsey, Bill Schmidt, Gary Schmidt, David Turnbull and George Walter.

The Canandaigua RC Laser Fleet would like to invite CYC members to show up at the clubhouse on Friday, August 26th and join them as they sponsor a happy hour (which in the true spirit of RC Laser sailing will actually be 3 hours long) that will start at 6:30 p.m. where you can meet the fleet, check out the boats and ask questions about RC Laser sailing.

Bring a perspective member with you and become eligible then to win a nice wine basket.

Bookmark http://RCSailors.com for links to the latest photos, current race results and all of the information about the Canandaigua RC Laser Fleet.

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Capt. Jack “Sparrow” Bennett Team Wins Eight-Legged Race

Posted on July 3, 2011 by Bill Blevins

After four light-wind races, the eight-legged team of Brennan Blodgett, Leslie Bennett, Jack Bennett and Christine Stebbins (L to R) won the Canandaigua RC Laser Fleet’s first annual Eight-Legged Race on Saturday, July 2, 2011. Team Yost from R.A.M.Y.A placed second with Team Blevins of Canandaigua taking third place honors.

The race results and a photo gallery have been posted.

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Four Sailors and Eight Legs Equals Twelve Winners

Posted on July 1, 2011 by Bill Blevins

Four beautiful hand painted Perrier Jouet champagne flutes and an exquisite bottle of bubbly will go to the winning team in the Canandaigua RC Laser Fleet’s first annual Eight-Legged Race!

The current plan is to set a short windward-leeward course and to race twice around the marks. We plan on holding a minimum of 6 races with the goal of finishing 8.

Each team member will sail one leg of the race. Each team member will be numbered 1, 2, 3 or 4, and in the first race, #1 will start the race and to around the first mark, then hand the transmitter to #2 who will handle the second leg and mark and then pass on to #3 and so on where #4 will handle the finish leg and cross the line.

In the next race, we’ll repeat the process, but sailor #2 will start and the process will repeat with the race ending when #1 crosses the finish line. #3 will begin the third race with #2 finishing, etc.

Remember, we aren’t doing the full-blown cookout this week so make your dinner plans accordingly. We are asking that people bring an appetizer to share. As per usual, we’ll have a few boxes of vino on hand.

One of our fleet members who can’t sail tomorrow has provided his boat for use if there are additional sailors who want to put together a team at the last minute. Thanks Dave Kelsey! So, get your team together and come on out and join the fun on the water or on the docks!

The race will start on the waterfront at CYC promptly at 4 p.m. Feel free to come out a little early and practice. We’ll have marks on the water by 3:15.

Give your entry fee of at least $15 per boat to the person holding the scorers clipboard with the collections envelope and make sure they write down your sail number. Since we are not getting any financial help from the yacht club for our starts this season, this money is being saved and targeted towards paying for our year-end awards.

See you on the water tomorrow where we’ll find out who wins the vin exquisite and who gets the plonk.

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The Eight-Legged Race Is This Saturday

Posted on June 28, 2011 by Bill Blevins

Start getting your crew trained and prepared for this weekend’s Eight-Legged Race!

This will be a RC Laser relay race where we’ll set out marks off of the south end of the docks at CYC and then announce courses that each have 4 legs.

Each RC Laser with a skipper and 3 crew members (eight legs, get it?) will take turns navigating the race course, passing the transmitter to the next person as the boat rounds a mark. Each person will drive one leg of the race.

Racing starts at 4 p.m. and we’ll try to get in at least 6 or 8 races, depending on the wind and then go calculate the scores to determine the winning team.

Bring $15 per boat as an entry fee that will be used for awards.

We won’t be having a cookout but we are encouraging everyone to BYOB and then also bring appetizers and munchies that could be shared.

We know of at least two people who have said they would show up and be “crew” if someone needs people. If you have an RC Laser and don’t plan on racing, but you plan on being down at the party, please bring it along as we’d like to encourage as many bystanders as possible to try sailing.

In other news, the racing results have been updated.

Both the seven-week Summer Low Point Series and the Women’s Low Point Series are being scored in SailWave and 40% of the races being thrown out. Just because you’ve missed a week, don’t give up! There are plenty of races yet to get your missed out of the scoring calculation!

 

 

 

 

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Spring “First Place” Series Wrap-up

Posted on June 20, 2011 by Bill Blevins

The Spring “First Place” Series is now complete with Bill Blevins, Gary Schmidt and Jonathan Gorbold racking up the most 1st places with 14, 8 and 7 respectively.

Nelson Habecker came on strong at the end of the series and won half of the races on the final Sunday!

Light winds combined with sloppy boat chop made for difficult tacking, especially out in the open water by the windward mark. Those who pushed their rudders over hard and tacked quickly while feathering out the main faired the best on the last day of racing in the spring series.

The spring series included 352 starters over 44 races.

Next Sunday, the seven-week summer series will begin. It will be scored using the traditional low-point system and all of the sailors will be back on the starting line together again.

In the womens series, Terry Schmidt topped the field yesterday and moved herself into first place overall, followed closely by Missy Porter, Tracy Blevins and Leslie Bennett.

The updated overall 2011 “Batting Average” high point calculation has been posted and it shows Jonathan Gorbold moving to the top of the leader board again over Bill Blevins by a margin of just 9/10,000 of a point!!

You can check out all of the scores on our results page which has been updated to reflect all races to date.

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Round Up Your RC Laser Crew Members

Posted on June 8, 2011 by Bill Blevins
Jack Bennett (#005) sails his RC Laser in the 2011 Squaw Island Race on Canandaigua Lake.

The next special race for the Canandaigua RC Laser Fleet will be the “Eight-Legged Race” which will be held at 4 p.m. on Saturday, July 2 at the Canandaigua Yacht Club. Each boat will need a skipper and 3 additional people to help sail as “crew.”

What is the Eight-Legged Race?
1 Skipper + 3 Crew = 8 Legs

This will be a series of races using multiple marks where each crew member, as well as the skipper, will sail one leg of the race and then pass the transmitter to the next crew members as each rounds a mark of the course. Full details will be posted shortly but go ahead and mark your calendars and then locate and start training your crew!

In other news, several of the women who come out to watch the Sunday afternoon sailing asked if they could have their own race so we’ve started a weekly Women’s Series. Tracy Blevins and Missy Porter are tied for first place after two weeks of racing, followed closely by Terry Schmidt.

The women will race at least once each Sunday during a break in the regular series which will usually happen around 5 p.m. The series will continue weekly throughout the year until Sailor’s Night where we’ll calculate overall low point scores for awards.

We usually have an extra boat or two available if there are any other women who would like to stop by and try their hands on the controls of an RC Laser.

In regular Sunday RC Laser sailing, Bill Blevins has taken the lead in both the overall season high point “Batting Average” scoring as well as in the Spring “First Place” Series.

As many of you know, we’ve implemented a staggered start sequence to spread out the fleet at the starting line where new sailors who have not won more than 3 races get to start 1 minute before the fleet. After winning 3 races, those skippers start 30 seconds ahead of the pack and after winning 3 more races, skippers start at the gun.

Bill Blevins and Gary Schmidt have worked their way to the scratch fleet and very clean air for their starts while David Turnbull, Bill Schmidt and Jonathan Gorbold will now be starting 30 seconds early after winning 3 races. Jack Bennett is only a win away from joining them in the middle start. Everyone else is getting better starts with less stress, bumping and banging into each other on the once-crowded start line.

And finally… stay tuned for more details about our fleet going up to race with the Rochester Area Model Yachting Association in a very unique day of sailing that they are proposing where our RC Lasers will be responsible for completing one leg of a relay race where we’ll be placed on teams with other types of model sailboats!

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New International RC Laser Class Racing Rules Approved

Posted on June 8, 2011 by Bill Blevins

International RC Laser Class Racing Rules have been approved and published to the RC Laser Class Association web site for members. Among the changes is that “D” sails have been added to the sail options for racing. Class members can visit http://rclaserna.com, sign in and then download a copy of the new racing rules.

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