Welcome to the Regatta Promotions Sailing Marketing Blog

It has been fun this winter traveling to events in Florida in the wintertime, then come back to share the stories with you all. I have been sailing the Etchells Jaguar Series, in VooDooToo, with Ralph Carpenter and my husband Brent Sullivan. We have qualified to represent our local Fleet here in Casco Bay at the Etchells Worlds in Chicago this June. Speaking of our local fleet, we have some other members from the local fleet that have been racing in Miami this winter. Nicole Jacques has been crewing for Rob Hitchcock and Terry Naylon has been helming the boat USA 1328. Cheer us all on this coming weekend!

Our team has been sailing together for almost two years now. Ralph is the technical guy, in charge all measurements for the rig tuning, as well as main and spinnaker trim. Brent is Mr. fix-it, team organizer and boat transporter on top of being our bow-man extraordinaire. I drive the boat and sometimes drive my husband crazy when at the helm!

The Etchells has been a great boat for us and we still learn new things about how to go fast every day! After this coming weekend, we will bring the boat home to Maine and she will make her next trip to Chicago for the NOODS as a tune up for the Worlds. We have never sailed in Chicago, so if you have any tips or advice for the windy city, let us know
~~/)~~ Gretchen Sullivan

Regatta Promotions is pleased to announce the hiring of Gretchen Sullivan. Gretchen joins the team helping with office management and will support Carter with sales. This is great news for us here at Regatta Promotions, as things are starting to get busy in preparation for another great summer of racing and fantastic events. Carter and Gretchen will be on hand at the Maine Boatbuilders Show next month. Stop by, say hello and find out what we have planned for the upcoming season!

So it’s still February and for most of us in the US that means cold winter. What can keep us motivated and interested in sailing all winter long? – other than reading this blog? Sailing Movies! Check out the list of my Top ten and answer the poll (scroll down the screen to see the answers) and let us know which is your favorite. You don’t agree with any of my answers, well I guess that’s ok just add your answer to the list. Also validate your pick by posting your comments to this blog entry right here! So what’s my number one pick? Dead Calm – great thriller, cool boat, explosions, blood, and decent sailing scenes. For sailing/racing authenticity I love Drum, which is about a maxi boat that capsized during the Fastnet race – losing its keel and then went on to place respectively in the Whitbread Race. Drum also has a good sound track by Simon LeBond of Duran Duran fame who is also the narrator. So many movies it’s hard to choose. There are many more that 10 sailing movies, want to know what they are? Check out this list that rates each movie and also gives a good brief description:

Nautical Movies

The St. Petersburg Nood Regatta this past weekend had an impressive turnout of 16 different classes of one-design racing. The largest fleet was the Melges 24’s, with 49 boats. The Flying Tiger had its first one-design debut on the east coast with an 8 boat fleet. The race committee made some interesting groupings of classes on the three circles they were running at the regatta. We found our J-24 class paired with the Melges 32’s, Melges 24’s, J-105’s. It seemed to us that we could have been placed with some more appropriately matched boats like the Ultimate 24 fleet, Sonars and the Vipers.
The race committee had its work cut out for them over the weekend with lack of cooperation from the wind gods. The breeze was very light and spotty for the first two days of the regatta. In fact, there was more breeze sailing out to the course each day than we had for the actual races, with the exception of Sunday. Sunday the breeze kicked up to 25+, just in time for everyone to line up for haul out and rig take-down. The land management and logistics with all of the boats coming and going were handled impressively and in that respect, I would attend another event run by the St Petersburg YC. We were proud to be sailing in the fleet with the overall winner of the Nood Regatta and Sunsail charter vacation, co-skippers Robbie Brown and Chuck Allen of RI.

March 1st in Arundel Maine, the Landing School will be playing host to some of the United States best short-handed sailors. Josh Hall, Bruce Schwab, Brian Hancock and Rich Wilson will be on hand to provide their thoughts and expertise about technologies and techniques that are required for successful short-handed racing around the globe. The lecture is open to the public and is free so make sure that you take advantage of this great opportunity to hear from the best. Their expertise can certainly be translated into benefits for any racer or cruiser wishing to get the best out of their boat and sailing experience.

Click the link below for more details about each expert and the times of the lecture and location of the Landing School.

http://www.landingschool.edu/documents/ShortHandedSail_000.pdf

The Florida State Championships, part of the Jaguar Series sailed in Biscayne Bay, FL concluded with yet another win by Bill Hardesty and crew. Hardesty has dominated the winter series with his eye set on a win at the 2008 Etchells Worlds hosted in Chicago this spring. Though conditions were challenging, Hardesty’s consistency was what led him to the top. Saturday’s races were delayed three hours on shore, waiting for the breeze to fill, however Sunday’s breeze more than made up for the lack of wind on Saturday. The 25+ knots of wind on Sunday resulted in broken booms, backstays, and torn sails at best. The unlucky few will have fiberglass and gelcoat repairs to be fixed before the final race of the series at end of this month.

With 89 boats on the line for this regatta, starts, mark roundings and finishes proved to be tight and exciting. The final beat in race two was supposed to be an upwind finish that ended up being a spinnaker run due to the wind shift. Our lesson learned; assign a crew member to keep an eye out for the boats around you at a tight finish. The race committee didn’t show us finishing in race 2 and without knowing exactly what boats we finished with, we weren’t much help to the committee. They did give us a finshing place after all was said and done, but it was subjective to say the least. Stay tuned for highlights of the Midwinters in a few weeks.

As promised we have a new poll added today. Every Monday we will bring you a new question. Yes, that’s 52 questions a year. Stay tuned as we run out of ideas it’s sure to get interesting.

So what is your favorite type of sailing? Mine is One-Design with handicap taking second place. Take the poll now, scroll the screen down and the poll is on your left.

It hasn’t been posted yet but many people have been asking so here is what the schedule should be:

The dates in bold have been confirmed by Regatta Promotions, check out our events tab on the left for links to some of these events. Registration for RP events will be starting around March 1st to the 10th. Sign up early!

• June 14 Centerboard Yacht Club Regatta
• June 21/22 Pilot Regatta at Portland Yacht Club
• June 28 Harraseeket Yacht Club Regatta
• July 12/13 State of Maine PHRF Championships and One Design Regatta
• July 19/20 Boothbay Harbor Yacht Club Regatta
• July 26/27 Seguin Island Race hosted by Southport Island Yacht Club
• August 2/3 Camden/Castine Race hosted by Camden Yacht Club
• August 2/3 Handy Boat Invitational
• August 8/9/10 Monhegan Island Race hoste by Portland Yacht Club
• August 16/17 MS Regatta
• August 22/23/24 PHRF New England Championships Marblehead, MA
• August 28-31 Yarmouth Cup – Not sure this is actually happening!
• September 13/20/27 Portland Yacht Club Fall Series

Not sure about whats happening downeast. Downeast Race Week or the MDI Series? Anyone know the dates?

Scroll down the page and you will find a quick and easy survey. The survey will change on a weekly basis so check back often for new and interesting questions about sailboat racing, sailing, event management and sailing in the news. Next new poll/survey will be posted on 2/10/08.