The Carolina Yacht Club hosted a South Atlantic Yacht Racing Association (SAYRA) regatta Aug. 6–7, an event with sound-side and ocean-side races for sailboats of all sizes, including a speedy craft rarely seen around Wrightsville Beach.
Sailors from Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina travelled to Wrightsville Beach to take part in the two-day event. The Carolina Yacht Club is one of the few locations that can provide such a variety of racing conditions in such close proximity, race director Jim Overton said.
“There are very few sailing clubs on the entire East Coast that can offer a venue with ocean sailing, and in just 30 minutes you can be in the sound, which is more calm and kid-friendly,” he said.
The Banks Channel races attracted mostly young children racing Optimist dinghies, tiny crafts with bathtub-shaped hulls and 7-foot masts. The children maneuvered their vessels back and forth between buoys, some intently focused on the wind and water conditions and others chattering as they sailed alongside their friends.
Sharing the course with the Optis were a few teenage crews sailing 420s, a slightly larger craft with a spinnaker sail.
Southwest breezes blew all weekend, creating choppy conditions in both the sound and the ocean, where Sunfish, Lasers and Lightnings raced. And, for the first time in years, the regatta attracted a class of vessel called a 505, which Overton described as a “two-man rocket sled,” adding, “they go faster than all the other boats put together.”
As the five 505 crews turned downwind, they unfurled their spinnaker sails and catapulted across the whitecaps. There is only one local 505 crew, Overton said — the boats are more commonly sailed around Norfolk, Virginia. But he’s hoping that, especially after this regatta, the speedy crafts will gain popularity in Wrightsville Beach.
The lightning sailboats are more popular in this area, Overton said, because they’re not intended for a sailor of a specific age. Local lightning crews range in age from young children to 70-year-olds, he said, and families often sail together.
“So this is a boat that folks in their 30s are realizing they can enjoy and sail well beyond retirement years,” he said.
Fourteen lightning boats sailed in the SAYRA regatta, navigating the challenging conditions alongside the Sunfish and Lasers. The safety committee was called into action throughout the weekend as the 20-mph wind gusts and ocean swells caused at least four boats to capsize on Saturday and a few more on Sunday. Overton credited his safety crew for jumping into the water to rescue the sailors.
“It was astonishing, the job they did,” he said.
One such incident became especially sketchy for Wake Forest’s John Pelosi and his crew. His lines became entangled and the 300-square-foot spinnaker sail wrapped around the mast, causing the crew to fall overboard. The sail gathered water, becoming heavier and heavier, so a safety crewmember grabbed the mast to keep the boat from turning completely upside down.
After numerous attempts to untangle the sails, Pelosi and the safety crew were able to drain enough water out of the boat to get it back to shore. Pelosi was so grateful to the volunteers who helped him that he decided to make a monetary donation to the Carolina Yacht Club. But in keeping with the spirit of goodwill, the yacht club put the money toward a grant program that helps young sailors compete by giving them a boat and paying their travel expenses.
“You just get warm fuzzies about that,” Overton said.
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