Club News


Area Qualifier for the US Match Racing Championship

By | July 24, 2014

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Area G/H/J/L Qualifier for the 2014 US Match Racing Championship for the Prince of Wales Bowl On the weekend of June 14 - 15 San Diego Yacht Club was proud to host the second of two International Sailing Federation (ISAF) Grade 3 Area G/H/J/L qualifiers for the 2014 US Match Racing Championship. The Championship is the Prince of Wales Bowl which will be held October 2 - 5 at St Francis Yacht Club.

In order for skippers to receive points toward their Match Race ranking, ISAF requires organizing authorities to meet certain criteria. Events are ranking on a scale of 1 (America’s Cup, World Match Race Tour, etc.) though 5 (one day, 4 boat affairs) and skippers receive ranking points through a complex formula that takes into consideration the difficulty of the event and how well they did. Most SDYC events, this one included, are ISAF Grade 3 and require the following criteria:

Boats shall

- be of the same design, and equal performance.
- have a minimum 5.9 m LOA (19.4 feet)
- capable of carrying spinnakers.
- have a minimum crew of three Competitors
- A minimum of eight skippers must be entered.
- At least 30% of the skippers must be a different nationality or travel more than 500 km to the event venue.
- The maximum average crew weight is 87.5 kg (192.9 lbs)

Race Management
- there shall be a minimum of two days scheduled for racing.
- all matches shall be umpired.
- at least two umpires must be ISAF recognized International Umpires.
- the notice of race and sailing instructions shall be based on the current ISAF standard.

The US Match Racing Championship (USMRC), often referred to as the Prince of Wales Bowl (or the POW), is a competition between yacht clubs, with each entry representing his or her respective yacht club. US Sailing divides the country into eleven areas, and then divides those areas into four groups (A/B/C; D/F; G/H/J/L; and E/K) for the match racing championship. Southern California falls within the geographical jurisdiction of Area J so is part of the Area G/H/J/L grouping, the largest of the groupings covering more The US Match Racing Championship (USMRC), often referred to as the Prince of Wales Bowl (or the POW), is
a competition between yacht clubs, with each entry representing his or her respective yacht club. US Sailing divides the country into eleven areas, and then divides those areas into four groups (A/B/C; D/F; G/H/J/L; and E/K) for the match racing championship. Southern California falls within the geographical jurisdiction of Area J so is part of the Area G/H/J/L grouping, the largest of the groupings covering more or less the western third of the U.S. plus Alaska and Hawaii.

Regatta Chair and Principal Race Officer Summer Greene and her race committee team efficiently ran two full round robins in the club’s eight J/22s for an exciting weekend of match racing down by the city front near the Star of India. It was a beautiful weekend for match racing, sunny skies with winds mostly in the 8 to 10 kt range blowing steady between 250 and 260 degrees throughout the weekend. The competition was stiff. Summer managed to complete round robin 1 and one flight of round robin 2 on Saturday. Ryan Davidson of Balboa YC was in first with eight wins and no losses followed closely by Nicole Breault of StFYC in second with seven wins and one loss. Nicole was followed by John Horsch of Treasure Island SC and Will Peterson of Cal YC in a two way tie for third both with four wins and four losses. On Sunday Ryan continued his winning streak and finished the weekend in first with fourteen wins and no losses. Ryan, along with crew Brandon Folkman and Mark Folkman will receive the invitation to the USMRC to be held at StFYC. Horsch came on strong on Sunday winning all of his matches to end up with ten wins and four losses, while Nicole had a mixed day. Nicole had three wins and three losses on Sunday finishing the weekend with ten wins and four losses resulting in her losing the tie breaker with Horsch for second place. There were not any what we sailors refer to as marshmallows in this competition, and at the end of the weekend there were a total of two (2) two way ties, and one (1) three way tie making for exciting match racing!

The West Coast is becoming a hot bed for match racing as evidenced by the number of entries submitted to the host clubs of the two area qualifiers. St. Francis Yacht Club hosted the first of the two area qualifiers back in April. Both clubs easily filled their eight entry per Qualifier maximum and had to turn away teams. The eight entries from SDYC Qualifier came from eight different yacht clubs and three Areas (St. Francis YC, Treasure Is. YC, and San Francisco YC representing Area G; Cal YC, Balboa YC, Del Rey YC, and San Diego YC representing Area J, and Waikiki YC representing Area H). During the trophy presentation Bruce Stone, the US Sailing Area GHJL Representative for the USMRC, thanked the club for hosting the event and praised all in attendance for making the Area Qualifier a great event and making match racing on the west coast a success. He said that between StFYC and SDYC there were a total of sixteen available slots and approximately twenty-four entries were submitted. He also informed us that Area GHJL was the only US Sailing Area Group that hosted two Area Qualifiers with the maximum eight entries each.

Finally, I would like to thank all those who helped make this event happen; including, but not limited to, Summer race committee team, my umpire team, club members who loaned their Whalers for use as umpire boats, club members who housed umpires and competitors, and Vice Commodore John Laun for presenting the trophies.