It was too long with no wind...unil it was too late! I was crewing on the I 20 Matt mentioned, sailed by Dave Ingram. We were about 5 minutes from the first bridge at the 6:30pm cut off time. There were a couple motor boats sitting there, I hoped they were finishing boats there but no, they told us "It's over for you..." So we went to shore to get food and beer. A couple of locals there told us about a boat ramp just north of the bridge so we decided to pull out there rather than risk spending the night drifting on the river.

Of course then the wind came up, as we were pulling the boat apart! It would have been nice to finish but not at the risk of spending the night out drifting.

Nice job Matt. You guys were way up there, ahead of just about everyone. Which side of the river did you go up after the second bend? We went up the left side, expecting the forcast east wind to be stronger there, but the boats who went to the right passed us in a very light breeze. There was also some adverse current until about 4pm when the tide changed. That may have been stronger on the left side, I don't know.

Was that a long day or what? Then, at 10pm, I drove the 4 hours back to Sebring, missing 9 deer on the road side and having many halucinations from about 1-2am! I got to sleep around 3am.

At 0800, the wife wakes me up and says for Mother's Day, she wants to go to Epcot to see the flower show.... I told her she's not MY mother!

I talked her into going shopping in Sarasota instead, Dinner at the Columbia and then Killwinn's candy shope for some fudge...

If you had been solo I'll bet you would have won it. I told you it's a light air race!

Next year, I'll be home if they do it on Mother's day weekend again! Drifting all day is not worth the payback I have to give mamma.