Phrf

The second day of Northern Bay Race Week was a pleasant and challenging one for the fleet of nearly 80 boats assembled off the mouth of Middle River.Using a 10.8-mile Olympic triangle course, competitors sailed i four PHRF handicap divisions and a one-design class for J/24s yesterday under sunny skies in steady southwesterly breezes ranging from 8 to 12 knots.Winner in the PHRF-B class for the day was artist Henry Peacoc on Ovation, a 35-footer he designed and built."We had fairly steady air, and the shifts were pretty marginal, said Ovation helmsman Skip Moorhouse, who also has been the sailmaker for the project since its inception last year.

Warren Richter has seldom enjoyed such a smooth trip to the finish line in any yacht race. So he was delighted yesterday when his boat made a virtually mistake-free run to a first-place finish in the A-2 class of the prestigious overnight Governor's Cup. For most of the 70-mile race from Annapolis to St. Mary's College, Richter watched his crew of eight sail a perfect race down the Chesapeake Bay aboard Pressure Drop, which he owns with his father Randy...

Chesapeake Bay Yacht Racing Association high-point standings for PHRF sailors, by far the largest contingent of the Handicap Division, which also includes IMS, MORC and Multihull competitors, have been finalized.Like other high-point standings, the PHRF scores represent an overview of each qualifying sailor's season of racing, with certain minimum requirements, such as the completion of at least five races and membership in CBYRA, PHRF of the Chesapeake and a CBYRA-member yacht club.Like other divisional scoring systems, in PHRF the final score is determined by dividing the actual number of points earned for starting, finishing and beating other starters, by the number of points it would have been possible to earn had a competitor won every race he or she started, plus 30.Bonus points for long-distance races, ranging from five for races of 20 to 49.9 miles, to 16 for races over 200 miles, but not exceeding a total of 30, also are included in the formula, and up to three races, one for every six completed, can be dropped as a worst-race throwout in the final calculation.

Fierce storms interspersed with dead calm presented major challenges to the 161 boats competing in the 2005 St. Mary's College of Maryland/West Marine Governor's Cup Yacht Race. The 32nd running of the oldest and longest overnight race on the Chesapeake began in Annapolis and finished in St. Mary's City. Throughout the night, racers dodged lightning and heavy rain. Between the storms, however, little progress was made on the 70-mile sail, with the first boat -- Wild Card, captained by Tim Layne of Glen Burnie -- not crossing the finish line until nearly 10 a.m. yesterday after beginning its trip at 6 p.m. Friday.

Shearwater Sailing Club's annual St. Brendan Cup Regatta last weekend drew 67 teams for a single contest on Saturday, sailing in eight PHRF splits and one-design starts for Catalina 27s and Tritons, followed on Sunday by a two-race series for 24 MORC and J/30 crews.Saturday's bigger boats in PHRF A-0, A-1, A-2, B and the new Sport class sailed a 19.3-mile course, while their smaller counterparts in PHRF C, D and Nonspinnaker and the one-design classes contended on a 12.9-mile version. It was a wet, cold day as steady rain drenched the fleet and winds were unpredictable.

Cooperative southwest breezes averaging about 10 knots along the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay south of the Bay Bridge sped this year's Hospice Cup XVI, the United States' largest charity regatta, along for the 120-odd teams of racers."

The Miles River Yacht Club and the Maryland Capital Yacht Club staged their annual Memorial Day races from Annapolis to St. Michaels and back the next day, drawing a typically large fleet last weekend.More than 160 boats started the race last Saturday morning from the mouth of the Severn River, sailing either a 24.3-mile course for the MORC, J/30 and PHRF A-C divisions or a 17.2-mile version for the other cruising one-designs, the multihulls, and PHRF Sport and Nonspinnaker. Light and fluky air stretched out the time for many finishers, although Miles River did not report times for the race.

Don Wagner, sailing Der Baron, won the best-in-fleet trophy for the second year in a row yesterday in the 29th Governor's Cup Yacht Race on the Chesapeake Bay. The 70-mile race for non-professionals began Friday at the entrance to Annapolis Harbor and finished in the early hours yesterday on the shores of the St. Mary's River in Southern Maryland. There were 161 yachts registered for the race, drawing thousands of fans to St. Mary's College, the host of the event. Wagner, a 25-year Cup veteran from Shady Side, took first in the PHRF A-2 class with a corrected time of 11 hours, 26 minutes and 23 seconds.

This year's Annapolis Yacht Club Fall Series, staged over the past three weekends, drew plenty of local and regional interest.Some 100 IMS, J/35, and PHRF A and B sailors were on the course on Saturdays, with similar numbers of PHRF C, MORC, and cruising one-design sailors competing on Sundays.IMS numbers continue to be light locally, but PHRF A-1 and A- 2 hit 31 and 41 entries, respectively, bringing the PHRF overall fleet numbers for the Saturday racing to 89 entries.AYC traditionally has scored both PHRF and IMS not only in individual class splits, but also as total fleets for Fall Series.

The calm that followed the storm slowed the flow of finishers to a trickle yesterday in the biennial Annapolis to Newport Race, one of the oldest ocean races still taking place on the East Coast.This year's 435-mile race began Saturday at noon off the mouth of the Severn River, with 55 boats racing in three IMS and three PHRF handicap classes.By 11 a.m. yesterday, all 18 starters in IMS Classes I and II, were finished or accounted for, as were eight in Class III IMS and Class IV PHRF. But by 5 p.m., only four more boats had crossed the finish line off Castle Hill Lighthouse in Newport, R.I., and there were still no finishers in Class V PHRF or Class VI PHRF Nonspinnaker.

Larry Bulman of Bethesda skippered Javelin to two trophies in the St. Mary's College of Maryland Governor's Cup yacht race, the overnight competition from Annapolis to St. Mary's City that concluded yesterday. The 30th running of the event attracted sailors from up and down the East Coast. Steady winds at 10 to 20 knots translated into some unusually fast times for the 150 boats competing in eight racing classes. "We had wind all night," said Ruth Way, a crew member on the 31-foot Trinity, which captured first place in the multi-hull class.

Chessie Racing, the Maryland entry in the 1997-98 Whitbread Round the World race, blew away its competition yesterday in the 21st annual Hospice Cup regatta sailed on Chesapeake Bay off Annapolis. The sleek white boat with the sea monster curling along its hull, a last-minute entry, was caught in the pack of nine entrants at the start of its PHRF A0 class race but quickly surged ahead on the first leg of the two-mile-long windward/leeward course set near Thomas Point Lighthouse. By the end of the first, downwind leg, Chessie was so far in front of the rest of its class, the only competition was for second place, eventually taken by Capricieuse II, skippered by Terry Unter.

Don Wagner, sailing Der Baron, won the best-in-fleet trophy for the second year in a row yesterday in the 29th Governor's Cup Yacht Race on the Chesapeake Bay. The 70-mile race for non-professionals began Friday at the entrance to Annapolis Harbor and finished in the early hours yesterday on the shores of the St. Mary's River in Southern Maryland. There were 161 yachts registered for the race, drawing thousands of fans to St. Mary's College, the host of the event. Wagner, a 25-year Cup veteran from Shady Side, took first in the PHRF A-2 class with a corrected time of 11 hours, 26 minutes and 23 seconds.

Bass pros get a shot at the largest purse ever offered in the sport this week when the $450,000 Wal-Mart FLW Tour Championship gets under way on the Mississippi River near Moline, Ill.The winner of the competition, which includes the top 50 pros and top 50 amateurs from the six events on the tour leading to the championship, will receive $250,000 cash.The first seed in the pro side of the competition is Denny Brauer of Camdenton, Mo., who won the Kmart Bassmaster Top 150 tournament on the Potomac River recently.

Cooperative southwest breezes averaging about 10 knots along the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay south of the Bay Bridge sped this year's Hospice Cup XVI, the United States' largest charity regatta, along for the 120-odd teams of racers."

The best was saved for last for many of the smaller yachts racing in the biennial Annapolis-to-Newport Race this week, as superb sailing conditions filled in behind the fleet Wednesday afternoon."

This year's Virginia Cruising Cup race from Annapolis to Hampton, Va., drew a PHRF fleet of 36 starters in five splits for the annual 120-mile chase down the Bay, beginning Friday morning, July 7.PHRF A-1 winner Rick Born of Baltimore brought the crew aboard his J/35 Grayling in for the win by a comfortable margin of nearly 40 minutes in class and posted the best finish in the fleet to win the Virginia Cruising Cup.Born described his team's 23-plus-hour contest...

SOLOMONS ISLAND -- Annapolitan Peter Gordon's Farr 44, Gaucho -- with 1992 Olympic silver medalist Jim Brady of Annapolis at the helm -- took the overall performance trophy yesterday as Yachting Race Week at Solomons Island came to a close.The Gaucho crew turned in a perfect five-ace series, repeating the accomplishment of a clean sweep in the boat's debut regatta, Yachting Race Week at Key West in January 1992.Eighty boats participated in the three-day event that had two IMS and five PHRF divisions.

For the second year in a row, the Potomac River has produced a record-setting tiger muskie, this time a 47-incher weighing more than 29 pounds.Kevin Conner of Martinsburg, W. Va., caught the record-setter on Feb. 14 near Clear Spring while fishing a plastic worm and lead-headed jig.John Mullican, a fisheries biologist with the Department of Natural Resources, verified the catch, listing it as 47 inches, 29 pounds, 4.75 ounces.The previous mark was set last March by Richard "Yogi" Sword of Clear Spring, who caught a 46-incher weighing 27 pounds.

ST. MARY'S CITY -- The 70-mile Governor's Cup sailing race from Annapolis to the first colonial capital of Maryland got off to a slow start Friday evening, and through the day yesterday competitors in the 179-boat fleet straggled across the finish line on the St. Mary's River.Baltimore sailors won two of the 10 racing classes, with Willard Scott winning PHRF B-1 and Howard Stroterhoff winning PHRF B-2.Racers said light winds kept speeds down throughout Friday night and yesterday, and by mid-afternoon, 20 boats were still racing.