My hometown of Mobile, AL hosts the annual Dauphin Island Race which is billed as the largest one day regatta in the United States. They typically get between 300-400 boats to race from the north end of Mobile Bay approximately 18 miles south to Dauphin Island. There was an article about the race in 2004 in SAIL magazine.

There are typically two starts. The handicap (PHRF) monoslug classes go first at 9:00 AM. They are followed by the one design and Portsmouth classes 30 minutes later. There are typically anywhere from 15-25 beach cats racing this event every year. The race is typically a beat for the first 9 miles to Middle Bay Light and than a close reach for the next 9 miles from Middle Bay Light to the finish. This can be a race made for an A-cat!

I last raced it in 2004. The race started in a light southwesterly but there was an inversion keeping a much faster moving upper easterly gradient from mixing with the surface air. For the first 30 minutes after the start, I worked away from the classes in my start and sailed through the back end of the PHRF monoslugs as the breeze backed into the southeast and slowly started to pickup. Just as I broke through to the front of the PHRF fleet which consisted of two Olson 40s, an Oyster 40, and a One Design 35, the upper air broke through to the surface and the breeze picked up from 8-10 knots to 20-25 knots. All I had to do was drop the traveller 3", pull on the downhaul, and rotate the rig. The 35-40 foot monoslugs were on their ears as their crews tried to get reefs in their mains. The looks on the faces of the 12-15 sailors sitting on the sides of these boats as I ripped past them going higher and faster was priceless.

I was the first boat to cross the finish line followed a couple of minutes later by Mark Ederer and Steve Beal on Mark's Nacra 6.0 NA. You could not even see the the sails of the lead PHRF boats we had passed. They ended up finishing one hour behind us.

The next day in the local newspaper, they did not even mention that Mark and I were the first boats to the finish line. They only talked about the first monoslug, the Oyster 40 which was named "Tyrant" (oh please). At least the article in SAIL magazine gave us beach cats credit for getting there way ahead of everyone else.

Oh well, it was a very fun day of sailing and I'll do it again this year.

Bob Hodges
A2 USA 230