Saturday’s races will take place in upper Charlotte Harbor, starting at noon. We will have our 15′ Boston Whaler on hand to set marks, run the starts, and keep score. We will run fairly short, easy races until we get tired of it, then go have a BBQ steak dinner party.
If conditions allow, Sunday’s race will be from Shell Creek to Ponce De Leon Park in Punta Gorda, as detailed below.
We expect everyone to operate under the standard Racing Rules of Sailing, as modified by these sailing instructions.
- Protests:
The Head Catboat Jib Trimmer In Charge is NOT interested in forming a committee to entertain your protests. Obey the rules, and if you believe someone else did not obey the rules, keep it to yourself. This is the Sun Cat Nationals! The very idea is intentionally ludicrous! If you take it too seriously, you will be expelled so that the rest of us can have fun. - Collisions:
Do not scratch my boats! Do not scratch each other’s boats! If a collision occurs that results in damage to any boat, I will post pictures and details at Sailing Anarchy, and then everyone involved will be sorry! - Use of engines:
If conditions allow, Sunday’s race will start upstream of my neighbor Frank’s dock on Shell Creek, east of US 17, and will end at Ponce de Leon Park in Punta Gorda. Racers will start under sail, and the use of engines to get under the US 17 and railroad bridges will be permitted only when in sight of those bridges. The use of engines will also be permitted within 100 yards of the Ponce Park/Punta Gorda Isles channel and within that channel to the dock. The fishing pier will be the finish line. If weather conditions make sailing in Shell Creek and the lower Peace River impossible, we will go to the Interstate 75 bridge under power, then sail on to Ponce Park from that point. If launching into Shell Creek is impossible due to low tide, we will do something else that day. - Punta Gorda Sailing Club Racers:
Sunday the 14th is the Punta Gorda Sailing Club Fall Series Race #5. Leave them alone! Sun Cat Nationals participants will remain well clear of all other boats under sail on the harbor, regardless of any other navigation rule or racing rule of sailing. If a PGSC racer might have to think about your intentions, you are too close. Use of engines to get clear of the PGSC fleet will be permitted, but only on downwind headings from 0 through 180 degrees. Causing a PGSC racer to alter course will result in disqualification. - Awards:
The soon-to-be-coveted Sun Cat National Championship Regatta Cup will be a disposable plastic cup with the name of the winning boat scrawled on it. (Note from the Jib Trimmer in Charge’s Wife in Charge: We might splurge and obtain a Tervis Tumbler for the award.) The finishing positions of each boat in each race will be tallied, and the boat with the lowest total score wins the Cup. We will have the awards ceremony in Ponce Park once all the boats are back on their trailers. Someone please remind me to bring a disposable cup and a Sharpie marker, because I’ll probably forget. That is how much you should care about this Cup. If you come and have fun, you win the much more important game of life!
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Revision to rule 3: The Sunday adventure race will end at Fishermen’s Village in Punta Gorda instead of at Ponce de Leon Park. The channel, dock, and ramp area at Ponce Park is just too small to accomodate a lot of boats at once, and they don’t serve drinks at the park, but the marina has bars.
Logistical Challenges:
How will we get all the boats to the starting line on Shell Creek on Sunday, and how will we get all the trailers to Punta Gorda and/or Port Charlotte boat ramps?
We can trailer the boats on Saturday, but launching here on Shell Creek may not be possible Sunday morning. We can also run the boats up here on the water following Saturday’s races. It is about 8 miles from the US 41 bridge to our place, so taking the boats here by water would take a couple of hours, but it’s a fun trip and would offer racers a look at the route to be followed on Sunday.
Comments from the peanut gallery would be welcome!
How about if one of the Saturday races is a “poker run” type race, in which the boats have to go into the powerboat section of Punta Gorda Isles (past a low fixed bridge) as part of the race course?
A herd of catboats dropping masts outside Fishermen’s Village would be pretty funny!
With regard to the Shell Creek event with its logistical, tidal, weather, navigational, and time-consuming challenges – I vote NO! To achieve the objective of having to lower the mast and raise it again for a bridge during a fun race, the alternative of using a Punta Gorda Isles Canal with bridge sounds good. In that regard, I’d like to offer a suggested route with SAFETY in mind. After one or more legs of racing under sail, have the leg end at the westernmost PGI Canal from Fisherman’s Village Marina. Boats would drop sail and easily enter the canal under power. Once inside, Skippers would have approximately 1/2 nautical mile to carefully, unhurriedly, and SAFELY lower the mast in very protected water before passing under the Marion Ave. Bridge. Masts can be raised anytime afterwards, again in protected water, before exiting the canal system and proceeding out Ponce De Leon Outlet/Inlet back into Charlotte Harbor. Upon reaching the outermost channel marker, sails can be raised and the race continued.
Don and I talked at length about sailing down Shell Creek on Sunday. I would like to get the group to sail down Shell Creek, but I can sail down it any time, and do not want to drag a bunch of unwilling sailors along! Feedback will be appreciated, and I won’t be insulted if everyone thinks it’s too much trouble.
On the idea of a course through Punta Gorda Isles, I have color enhanced this image to clarify what Don is talking about (in green) and an alternate route shown in blue, in which the boats would just go to a private residence and pick up a flag or card and return.
With some Captains and boat crews coming from afar, Saturday is the day for enjoying as many memorable events as possible, yet avoiding a hectic schedule and logistic nightmares.
One of the most enjoyable events I’ve experienced at various sailboat and trawler Rendezvous is to allow sufficient time in the schedule for Owners/Crews to see all boats together in one location and discuss various modifications, get questions answered, and pick up ideas they might like to apply to their boats.
A good place for this, where boats can be beached IN SAND, IN SHELTERED WATER, is the Port Charlotte Beach Complex across the harbor from Punta Gorda up the channel in Alligator Bay. This complex also has two double wide launch ramps nestled between three docks, and PLENTY OF PARKING!
If we launch boats there, enjoy the race(s), return to the sheltered sandy beach for boat mod discussions, and leisurely retrieve boats in turn at the ramps adjacent to the sandy beach, we should have plenty of time to get cleaned up and get to the “Jib Trimmer’s” House for a steak dinner. That’s what I call hassle-free logistics.
The Port Charlotte Beach Complex is our best area boat ramp. The ramp at Laishley Park is nice but very slick, and the one at Ponce Park can be a bit tricky due to the current.
The swimming area on the harbor side of the beach park is a boat-free zone, but there area couple of small beaches on either side of the boat ramp. I think I would just put ours on the trailer instead of the beach.
Of course, we could bring all the boats up Shell Creek and have a big raft up here… What do others think?
I like the trip up Shell Creek after looking at it on google earth. This way we are all on your home ground and nobody can get their feathers fluffed if Lee parks in the wrong place; he does that some times!! I am comming for the fun and going up the creek sounds good.
If some want to take the boats up Shell Creek at the end of the day on Saturday and back down Sunday morning and others do not want to do that, I could lead a separate group to do that. It’s about 8 miles in the Peace River and Shell Creek from the upper harbor. An interesting trip, but I understand if not everyone wants to bother. Our boats will be safe up here in the water overnight.
To the right honorable Jib Trimmer: I can not believe I just bought a Suncat (!!) and am in the process of rescuing it from a Long Island winter, so it will be here in SW FL soon. I sailed a bayhen in Charlotte Harbor back in the 80′s, when all of y’all were still somewhere else. With all due respect, the Shell Creek stuff is too complicated for me. I agree Pt Charlotte Beach is best launch, but pretty far from cool destinations. What about launch from Pine Island Marina, sail past Useppa to Cabbage Key, have festivities there and return to Pine Island. Just my $.02, still not believeing I am a cat sailor again, (partly your fault for being such a good promoter of the “fleet”). For anyone interested, I just posted on my facebook acct some old pics of the bayhen in Biscayne Bay, surfing back from Stiltsville.
Hi Linda, Glad to have you join the catboat fleet! Pine Island Sound is nice, but Pineland Marina charges $15 to launch and park these days, yet somehow manage to make the restaurant at Cabbage Key seem bargain-priced. Also, not a lot of sailing water down there compared to the upper harbor, and housing everyone Friday and Saturday nights could get expensive and logistically complicated. The other problem would be that senior Sun Cat sailor Joe has no tow vehicle, and relies on me to launch and recover his boat once a year. It will be on the lift with trailer put away by the time the Nationals come around.
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Update for the 2011 Sun Cat Nationals: I am not going to attempt to herd all the cats into Shell Creek this time! We will race in the harbor on Saturday, November 5th and sail around in the harbor on Sunday the 6th.