The Lost Coast Chapter of the |
The morning of the 2008 Sausalito Open Ocean Regatta dawned crisp and clear. There's nowhere more magical than being on the water at dawn. The sun rose in the east, and next to us - to the west - was the Sausalito marina. Stan and Jim had trained for months and were ready for the race. It was sunny and clear, and the ferocious winds the day before did not return.
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The rowers are told to start, so off they go. The water front of Sausalito gradually regress into the background. Stan looks around from time to time to make sure Jim is heading the boat in the right direction.
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Looking ahead, the goal is to keep in close to the shore, but head to Lime point, at the foot of the north tower of the Golden Gate Bridge. This is arguably one of the most beautiful scenes in the world. The rowers are enjoying the scenery, but are rowing hard against a building flood tide.
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The intrepid rowers in their whitehall have made it under the bridge and are heading west. Flood tide is definitely building, but Stan steers a course that picks up the eddies and eases their progress toward Point Diablo, one mile beyond. The rowing shells, dispatched twenty five minutes after Stan and Jim, are now just appearing on the horizon.
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The rowers reached Point Diablo with surprising ease, and are heading back toward the bridge. Taking advantage of the flood tide, Stan and Jim steer further out into the chanel and are finding they can drive their sturdy wooden boat with ease at about six miles per hour. They are pleased to see that many of the shells are staying inside the tide line, and not getting that extra "push", so they are having some difficulty passing the wooden boat. Meanwhile, the sun is warming the atmosphere and Stan feels the need to shed his shirts.
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Back under the bridge and inside the bay, the course takes the rowers to a point off Tiburon that is marked by a green buoy. The tide turns and pushes the boats up toward Richardson Bay, so the appropriate course compensation must be made. Shells are now passing with regularity on both sides. Jim has a hard time spotting the buoys, but Stan keeps the rowers on course tightly around the buoys and onto the finish line twenty five minutes after the fastest shell.
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The rowers find that most others had as good a time as they did, and pleasant exchanges with the others occurred on the water all the way back to the OWR docks.
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Stan and Jim get medals for their performance in a traditional wooden boat. Gordy Nash of OWR gives Stan special mention for his long history of competing in open water rowing events along the West Coast.
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Stan and Jim revel in their victory. The boat they rowed in is in the background, and is Selby Drew's boat, an 1880 New York Whitehall design. It is sixteen feet in length; the oars used had spoon blades and were 8' and 8 1/2' in length.
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