The 2012 CA Dreamin' Series Match Race in Long Beach, a.k.a., the Butler Cup, was hosted by Long Beach Yacht Club on March 17-18, 2012, and was to be sailed in their fleet of Catalina 37 Sailboats. Eight skippers were invited to the event, including:
My team consisted of Parker Mitchell (SDYC), Bill Pascoe (SDYC), Alex Jacobs, Jim Lincoln, Mike Corzine, and Ben Wheatley. I was able to arrange accommodations for the weekend at crew member's houses who lived in the Long Beach area, which resulted in significant cost savings.
Unfortunately, the weather conditions for the Butler Cup were not conducive to match racing. The forecast was for strong winds on both Saturday and Sunday and those predictions came true. Following the skipper's meeting on Saturday, the Principal Race Officer, Pete Ives, took a small power boat out to the race course area and found wind in the 20-25kts range, with gusts topping 30kts combined with large, steep chop. The wind strength was clearly above the upper limit set for the event of 18kts and the sea state would have posed a challenge for the onthewater umpires. So racing for Saturday was called off completely without any of the Catalina 37's ever leaving the dock.
On Sunday, Pete Ives was determined to give it his best shot at getting some races completed, so he had all (8) teams rig the Catalina 37 sailboats and head out to the race course area. Once we cleared the channel leading out from Alamitos Bay, it was apparent that the wind conditions were just as strong as they had been the day before and the wind had a biting chill to it. Still, we pushed onward and went to the northern end of Long Beach Outer Harbor in search of acceptable racing conditions. The wind was easily 20-25kts with gusts once again over 30.
The race committee set anchor and the competitors raised sails to get in some practice time. Going upwind was a real challenge. The mainsail on these boats does not have any reef points and the 135% jib was simply overpowered. Going down wind, however, was a real hoot. We were surfing down waves with the jib and main set wing and wing. The gybes were a bit tricky, but we were able to maintain control and not round up.
After sailing around for 45 minutes, the umpires came up to each boat to tell them to drop their jibs and sail around with just the mainsail. Some boats took refuge in the lee of one of the manmade oil drilling islands in the harbor. The Race Committee did their best, waiting approximately another hour for the wind to let up without any luck. Finally, racing for the day was abandoned and the Butler Cup was over without sailing a single match. Extreme disappointment was spread equally amongst competitors, umpires, race committee, the organizing authority and all the volunteers at Long Beach Yacht Club who worked tirelessly to organize the event.
Based on the combined results from earlier San Diego and San Francisco stops, the overall winner of the CA Dreamin' Series was Nicole Breault, who received an invitation to sail in the Ficker Cup the following week. The Ficker Cup is a feeder event for the Grade 1 Congressional Cup in two weeks time.
Thanks again for the support from San Diego Yacht Club!
Best regards,
Dan Aeling