The Roger Cable Memorial Series is named in honor of longtime Nawiliwili Yacht Club member Roger Cable who passed away on 9/22/22 at the age of 84. Roger had a general aviation background and worked at Cable Airport in Upland, California. Here on Kauai Roger was general manager at Inter Island Petroleum. But more importantly to those of us racing sailors is that Roger held the Papa Au crew together and he kept the boat racing up until he passed. He will be missed by his wife Roberta and all of us who knew him.
This first race in the series had the unusual course V-X which headed in the reverse direction from usual. This was an upwind leg towards the mountain to round the G-7 buoy, then downwind to the Kalapaki buoy leaving it to port, out around the Ninini Lighthouse buoy with the second lap upwind to the G-11 buoy by the Coast Guard Station leaving it to port, around the Kalapaki buoy to port, and back to the finish. The distance was 3.17 miles. The wind was listed at 7 knots out of the South (except when it wasn’t, which was often). Again the light flukey air with huge wind shifts made things challenging.
All the boats were late to the start in the light conditions. Fast Company crossed the starting line first and they were closest to the race committee but in very light air. It took the other boats who were moving slowly a while to get to the starting line. Zachary Lange was on the helm of Weatherly and he is the lead sailing instructor for the Kauai Sailing Association. He was nice to Ozone at the start when he could possibly have pushed them above the starting pin forcing them to restart in very light air. (We owe you one Zach!)
Ozone was on port tack just above Weatherly and they now caught some wind and took the lead. Meanwhile, Fast Company was low and slow compared to all the other boats and they were in the unusual position of being in last place. Ozone caught some more wind and rounded the G-7 buoy first. Double Espresso was rounding next and wanted to fall off towards the anchored trimaran Meshach where they saw more wind. But Bonjolea II right next to them wanted to come up and prevented that. And they passed Double Espresso. And when Fast Company finally rounded the G-7 buoy, Ozone was halfway to the Kalapaki Buoy and their lead
seemed insurmountable. But Fast Company was now able to pass Speedy,Weatherly, and Double Espresso.
Ozone’s skipper Chris Jordan thought he had this race in the bag and he turned over the helm to Alison Fornari who did a fine job sailing out to the lighthouse and back to the harbor. But being smart, Alison turned the helm back over to Skipper Jordan as the wind became light and flukey entering the harbor. Ozone’s skipper floundered in the light shifting winds, tacking back and forth trying to make some progress. And after rounding the G-11 buoy by the Coast Guard Station both Fast Company and Bonjolea II caught up to Ozone. At the Kalapaki buoy Fast Company took the lead and when they tacked onto starboard Ozone decided to duck them rather than to lee bow them, which may have been a mistake. Now trying a tacking duel, Ozone fell behind Fast Company who covered tack for tack. And at the finish it was Fast Company first with Ozone 46 seconds behind. An unbelievable comeback for the Fast Company crew from last to first place. Bonjolea II finished third followed by Weatherly, Double Espresso, and Speedy.
What a race!
-Chris
Click for complete results and the RaceQs replay on the
Club Racing page.