PRE-RACE TOP 10 List by Steve Piche, Founder of the Great Texas 300 and Skipper of Team Great Texas, Follow us at gt300.com
The 13th annual Great Texas 300 is set to start on Thursday, June 18th at 10 am in South Padre Island! Due to Tropical Storm Bill, we have postponed the start by one day and combined the last two legs to allow us to sail the full course.
Back by popular request, I will be writing my top ten list for each day of the event (if not too tired and beat up). I am throwing in a bonus pre-race edition top ten here that gets you ready for all of the excitement of this year’s Great Texas. So, here we go, the first top ten list for the 2015 Great Texas.
1. Can John Tomko and Ian Billings Repeat? John and Ian have won four of the last five Great Texas 300’s which is a pretty impressive record. They are odds on favorites to take line honors again. However, there are nine other teams in the hunt ready to pounce if John and Ian should run into a bit of bad luck. (In 2009, John and Ian broke their mast on the second leg which opened the door to Chris Green to claim the victory.) We have some wily old vets (like me) who are chasing fame and glory and some first-timers who are ready to take on the wild Texas coast. Whoever wins, it will be an interesting battle.
2. Welcome to our Playground! The Great Texas 300 takes place on the biggest, most glorious playground in the entire state of Texas. Many people come to see our playground. They put their toes in the water - some wade out into the surf to enjoy a swim, but few, very few keeping going beyond the surf. Beyond the surf is a magical world devoid of human presence – a world of wind and waves. (Fishermen rarely venture on our playground – we rarely see any boats over the first two legs of the race.) Out in this world, for four (three this year) days each year, I get to play with my best friends. We all play the sailing version of King of the Hill.
3. What’s New this Year? We are exciting to announce that we will have satellite tracking of all boats during this year’s event. You can go to GT300.com to get the link to the live tracking. Since much of the race is run well off-shore, we need to use satellite tracking rather than the more common cell phone tracking. Our trackers are set up to send a message every 2 minutes so we hope to have near real time tracking.
4. Bill: Mother Nature is throwing us a curve ball by sending a tropical storm across our playground. The sailors unanimously agree to delay the start by one day and combine the final two legs (although we are stopping at Cat Alley rather than East Beach). The weather looks good for the next three days – we will have a good strong breeze which hopefully will allow us to make it to Galveston in three days. The legs are going to be long and tough (105 miles, 101 miles and 85 miles) but that is what sailing the Great Texas is all about.
5. Welcome to the Travelers: We welcome Team Chiindi from Arizona and Team Wisconsin from well you know, Wisconsin. It is always good to have some out of staters come join us for our run up the coast. Each boat of the out of state boats has a rookie and a veteran aboard.
6. Work, work, work: Everyone is out in the heat of the day working on their boats. We do a lot of special modifications for this race. We add a doubler to our spinnaker sheet, add ratcheting blocks, a mast rotator, etc to the boat. And then there is the safety gear – it takes hours to get it all set up and ready for the race. Everything has to be charged up, checked and re-checked. On-line accounts need to be updated. The list goes on and on. Welcome to boat prep for the race.
7. Play, play, play: One of the best feelings in the world is finally pushing off the beach on Thursday morning. After weeks of prep, you are finally sailing and what a sail it is! The run from South Padre to Mustang Island is my favorite leg. Typically, it blows from the southeast and it is a beautiful downwind run. (However, with the funky weather this year, it may be a bit different.) Finally, we sail right on to the beach at Mustang Island and Andrew Tatton of Triple Threat BBQ has food waiting for us!
8. Lupe Tortilla: Speaking of food, we are seriously happy to have Lupe Tortilla on board as a Gold Sponsor. They will be catering the awards banquet in Galveston. Lupe Tortilla serves up world class Mexican food throughout the state of Texas. They are also the title sponsor for John and Ian’s team. By catering the final dinner, we were able to shift money from the banquet to the tracking. Lupe Tortilla’s sponsorship literally makes it possible for you to follow us up the coast.
9. Organizers: We would be remiss to not recognize the tremendous amount of work that has gone into this event. Terri Reuwsaat, our Commordore, keeps the gears greased and the machine going. Thanks to the many other officers and PRO. A special thanks to our new beach captain, Carla Cardini, who has done a great job setting all the hotels, parties, etc as we travel up the coast.
10. Come Join Us! If you are not flooded out (and we are not flooded out), come join us! We love spectators, follower and fun people. Join us on the coast this week!
