LHYC.org September
2004
Mission Statement:
The objects of the Lloyd Harbor Yacht Club shall be to encourage and promote interest in, as well as to foster the art and enjoyment of, the sport of sailing by providing the opportunity and means for the development of individual skill and knowledge, encouraging excellence in seamanship and navigation, and by providing participative events wherein these qualities can be exercised under the aegis of the LHYC burgee.
I hate this time of
year!!! Labor Day has come and gone,
which can only mean one thing…summer’s over.
Everyone’s back to school, the Summer Series’ are completed, and those
pick-up long weekend cruises are out of the question. Only in our memories are we capable of stopping the march of
time. There are still a couple on the
water events to go, the Woman’s Skippers race/ De-commissioning, (10/3), and
the Fall Sprint Series, (10/10). Hope
to see you out there.
Member News
As I write this the J-24
World Championships are almost upon us.
They will be racing Monday, 9/27 thru Friday 10/1 at Noroton YC. If you haven’t heard already, we should be very
proud that one of our very own, Aidan Glackin and company, have qualified! If anyone is interested in taking a day off
from work and going over to view the racing, the Fleet 106 Fleet Captain Joe
Scarpulla is coordinating boat pooling.
He can be reached at (631) 427-9368 or jjsarch@aol.com,
and the results can be followed at j24worlds.com. Good luck Aidan.
One of our newer members is going to be expanding our
ranks…Pete Zarcone was able to convince Christy Foresta to marry him. Leaving nothing to chance, Pete really
pulled out all the stops. In late
August, he arranged entrance to the Huntington light house, posted a huge
banner asking her to marry him, and then later sailed her by it. An evening champagne cocktail in the light
house after topped off the night. Very
smooth sir.
Past Events
I was bubbling over with pride at the Little Brown
Jug, as the call for participation provoked a great showing with 16 boats on
the line. The race committee of Joe Nakalski
and the Zzzooom crew set the traditional course of 11B and back in a lovely
southerly. With the sun shining
brightly the fleet headed downwind to the mark, and after the beat back, Roy
Berg and crew on Ember proved to be the overall winner. I’m looking forward to the Awards Dinner
when you get to take this beautiful perpetual trophy away from last year’s
winner. Just beware Roy, for as you
know, they get to poor a shot of the secret elixir from the jug for you before
you can get the hardware. After the
race we all meet at the beach for a BBQ.
Thank you to Alice Blauvelt, Mike & Bernadette Olsen for all their
help running the party for us.
The Labor Day cruise too had
good turn out, including Mother Nature in all her glory. If you haven’t noticed the pictures on the
web site, take a look and you’ll notice one of the night shots of the raft up
includes some power boats. To answer
some questions I’ve received, no, the By-laws have not been changed to include
power boaters. Let me start at the beginning…
1500 Saturday at the Port
Jefferson mooring- After a lovely day on the mooring messing about in the
little boats, to the beach, to town and into Setauket, more and more boats
started to arrive from abroad. Cocktail
time saw 7 boats in all, with quite a lot of LHYC team spirit. Hating to break the raft-up apart we did the
responsible thing and listened to NOAA at 2200, “light and variable, going NE
late 8-10 kts.” OK, we’ll give it a
go…2330 the NE fills with a furry of 25-30 with much higher gusts. As we all scamper about striking sun covers,
etc. the raft starts to drag, right towards another raft of 
power boats. We start to break the raft up and motor into
the wind when one of our rudders snags their mooring ball! I quickly climb down the swim ladder and
start jumping on the mooring pennants to free them, but realize the swim
ladder would be a problem if I succeeded.
One of the men from the other raft then climbs down to take over for me,
(his wife by the way had come out the front hatch butt naked). As the raft became smaller, we were able to
free the rudder. We then spring forward
and came right back along side their raft like we meant it. A few fenders and dock lines and we ended up
with the picture you can see, (by the way, it couldn’t have been all that
chaotic, since one of us was kind enough to document the whole thing in
pictures, (sans the nudity)). As
morning broke and after spreading some good old LHYC comraderay with our new
friends, we all began to practice some boating science 101 in a mere 15-20,
trying to untangle the three remaining boats from various lines and anchors
deployed at night. I must congratulate
all involved in their cool headedness, and there was zero damage or injury!
Boner and Grounder Nominations
While I’m on the subject, I
might as well take this time to make some other nominations for our two most
prestigious awards. I almost let this
one slip through the cracks. It dates
back to the 4th of July cruise, when one of our Board members
brought his boat around to Oyster Bay shorthanded to pick up his wife there,
(she gets sea sick). While finding his
way to the dock he found one of the shallower spots, tide going out! He, and she, waited patiently of the water
to return, and then get her on board just in time to see the fireworks.
Another happened when one of
our members took one of our most visible boats to Stamford for the high profile
Stamford Denmark race. After going to
the party and being called to the podium to take a picture accepting his award
from their Commodore, they headed back to start the journey home. With the echoes from one of the crew’s
remarks while finding a mooring on the way in, (Stamford is a shallow and rocky
harbor), ringing in their heads, they head out of the mooring field. It must be safe if other boats are moored in
the area, so why go straight out to the channel when you can cut the corner
through the field? A bit of throttle
and some rum and wouldn’t you know the bottom jumped right up and grabbed them
hard. Bodies flying, one hung by his
waist in the companion way upside down for a while makes quite a memory. The crew however, showed their years of
experience, and not a drop of beer or rum was reported spilled.
Please keep the nominations coming
in, the seasons not over, and you too could get your name engraved on one of
these fine plaques.
Upcoming Events
Sunday, 10/3/04 is the annual
Woman’s Skipper race, (flyer enclosed).
This is a great time for the woman to show us how it’s really done. There’ll be two divisions to keep the sharks
from the minos, and the woman have to drive, but can have anyone they want on
the boat, (men included if they want).
It is also jib and main only.
This is followed by the De-commissioning afterwards at the Club
mooring. Hope to see you there, and if
you can’t/don’t want to race, hope you can make it to the raft-up.
The Fall Sprint series will
be Sunday 10/10/04. Even if you don’t
race, please feel free to come to the party afterwards. Watch the web site for the party
announcement. Rich Rubel is still
looking for a PRO for this and the Woman’s Skippers race. If you could help out, or would just like to
go along to learn, please give him a call at (631) 754-0891 or fleetcapt@lhyc.org.
The 7th annual
Oyster Festival cruise is Sat./Sun. 10/16 & 10/17. Anyone not doing Manhasset Fall series and
would like to get one more weekend in, this is a nice time. We typically get moorings at Oyster Bay
Marine Center, (516) 922-6331, and it’s only a short walk from there to the
festival. Anyone interested in
coordinating can call Leigh Sterflinger at (631) 757-0799 or vicecomm@lhyc.org.
Awards dinner- Saturday
11/13/04, Holiday party- Sunday 12/5/04.
Odds and Ends
I’ve made a copy of the ½
hour spot Gary Jobson did every night during the Olympics, and put it in our
video box. I only got four nights on
tape, so if you have any coverage please let me know. I’ll copy them and return them back to you. If you’ve never been to the box, it’s in the
Willis office, to the right as you walk in.
Just take what you’d like, sign them out, and put them back when you’re
done.
If you’ve used one of the
Club moorings this summer please forward $20/night for Block Island, $15/ night
for Pt. Jefferson to our Treasurer, at the Club PO box 60, Huntington N.Y.
11743.
See You Out There,
Commodore