Saturday, July 23, 2016

Horribly Misshapen Sunfish

One of these boats is not like the others

Ninety plus degree temperatures and gusty siroccos greeted the brave souls who showed up for the Saturday Sunfish Series this weekend. Even more astonishing was the fact that nobody capsized, purposely or otherwise.

There were five racers at the start, including Derek Stow, who showed up in a horribly misshapen Sunfish that looked as if half its fiberglass had been removed, a spar was missing, and its sail had been mauled in a horrible sail loft accident. The poor boat didn't look like a Sunfish at all.

The condition and USCA class legality of his unfortunate boat notwithstanding, Derek took the first race by a wide margin. After which, he graciously agreed to give the class legal Sunfish a minute head start, which evened things up considerably.  Each race had a different winner and a different number of legs, thanks to some confusion and fancy footwork by the Race Committee. Even so, several races were decided by inches.

A couple of weeks ago, we posted a video showing an RS Aero blasting past a Sunfish.


This week we post the rebuttal:


This week marks the last week of racing for a while for John Houstle, who is undergoing surgery on Monday. He says the procedure will make him lighter and more nimble in the boat. Based on his results today, if that's true, he's going to be hard to beat. We wish him good luck and a speedy recovery and return to the race course.



And we really have to pitch in to get Derek a better Sunfish.