2019 LOOR Racing Guide

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2018 LO600 Finish Challenging the Lake Ontario 600 - Double Handed By Bert Barrett SV Upstart, Sunfast 3200 CHALLENGE The Lake Ontario 300 is the world’s longest annual fresh water race. Just over four years ago the Lake Ontario 600 (brainchild of locally renowned solo sailor, Brent Hughes), came into being. This race is held biennially in conjunction with the LO300. Competitors first compete in the 300, cross the finish line, and, without stopping, continue to do the same 300-mile course a second time. Eleven boats registered for the LO600 in 2018. Most of these entries were members of the Great Lakes Singlehanded Society and therefore single handed. There were also fully crewed boats and my own boat, “Upstart“, which was double handed. Due to the small number of entries, all boats in the LO600 are lumped into a single division. Yes, single handers are in the same division as fully crewed and double handed boats -- hence the LO600 may be considered more a “challenge” than a true race. In my mind, 600 miles double handed, compared to 600 miles single handed, is “a walk in the park.” My sailing partner and I have completed several double handed distance races together and we understand the importance of one of us taking a nap whenever there is any sort of downtime. Single handers can only take 10 to 15-minute naps at a time, and to actually nap for 10 minutes during a race means one has to be really tired. In reality, this means real sleep starts to happen only on the second day of the race. Fatigue has already set in and consequently the single hander never breaks out of sleep deprivation mode. Sleep deprivation is not usually a problem on fully crewed boats but having to spend hours adrift under the blistering sun with different personalities in close quarters waiting for wind can be extremely demoralizing. The 2018 LO300 was particularly grueling. It was not the dread of storms, but a light air race with large windless holes. Boats were becalmed for long periods in scorching heat under a blistering sun while crews fought vicious, biting flies. Many boats retired from the 300 and only six of the 11 boats registered for the 600 continued onto the second lap. Beginning this second lap, Upstart had set course for Ford Shoal some 120 nautical miles away. Broad reaching, with spinnaker flying in 10 knots of breeze, we thought we were in for a very comfortable ride for the duration. By early afternoon however, we were experiencing gusts of over 25 knots and doused the chute. Later that afternoon, following seas grew larger as the wind built. Frequently we saw boat speeds of 11 knots as we surfed down these waves. Shortly before dark we switched to our heavy weather jib and reefed the main, sacrificing speed for safety. Just before midnight, I heard the Coast Guard responding to a call from Revival, a single-handed Abbot 30. Revival was out of VHF range for me to
Lake Ontario Offshore Racing Guide Page 21 hear her side of the conversation, but I understood she had a problem, was retiring from the race, and heading back to Port Credit under jury rig. The Coast Guard needed a complete inventory of Revival’s flares, other safety equipment, and wanted an hourly situation report, until she reached Port Credit. (We later learned that Revival had lost her forestay.) Soon after, I listened in to a conversation between Brent Hughes on Pearl and the captain of a westbound freighter. Brent confirmed that he was aware of the freighter’s course and speed and would be keeping clear. I could see that freighter on my AIS--but also saw an eastbound freighter. Pearl was a few miles behind us and I imagined Brent trying to navigate between shipping lanes and the two freighters as they passed each other in the night. Quite an unnerving situation in the dark. I was then hailed by the skipper of a sailing vessel who wanted to know my position because he was unable to identify my navigation lights. I turned on my deck light and that seemed to cheer him. Brent did the same. The unknown skipper said he was heading for Rochester, but neither Brent nor I were able to see his navigation lights. We suspected he was without electrical power (using a hand-held VHF radio), and this was confirmed a few hours later when the Coast Guard hailed him requesting his ETA for Rochester. They intended to meet him there. Two passing freighters at night coming in opposite directions at the same time, joined by a sailboat in distress without lights combined with that night’s wind and sea state can produce stress that really sucks the energy out of you. When the crises had finally passed, Brent hailed me and said Pearl was having some serious electrical problems. The house battery was discharging at an alarming rate and somehow his engine battery was being drained simultaneously. His engine barely kicked over, nearly failing to start, when he tried to recharge. Brent and I have had several latenight radio conversations over the years and I could tell from his voice, this time, that he was exhausted. See Brent’s full accounting of this LO600 Challenge in ‘How To Eat Your Words’, beginning on page 16 of this Guide. It would be an understatement to say that I found my conversations with Brent overnight and the next morning extremely poignant. His decision to retire left me confused and stuck for words. Although he was a few miles behind us, Brent, on corrected time, had a comfortable lead. Never before had he retired from a race. The crown that Pearl had been wearing on the tracker and leaderboard for four days was being passed to Upstart and I was mute. Brent, "father" of the LO600, was retiring. The fact that,
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Photo - courtesy of The Broad Reach
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2019 LOOR Racing Guide

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