The Governor’s Cup Yacht Race was held Friday, Aug 5 – Saturday, August 6, 2016. On Wednesday, August 10, Assistant Director of the Waterfront, Captain Rick Loheed, gave the Communications Committee his account of the experience:

The start was spectacular, the Race Committee was taken out to Annapolis area mark R2 on a gorgeous Beneteau 48 that served as the Committee Boat. We were joined by a 36 Ft Edgewater power boat which served as the check in boat. The weather was superb. We anchored a few hundred yards from the mark and squared the line to the wind. The starts went off very well, with a southerly breeze freshening as the afternoon went on. The SMCM boat ‘Sundog‘, our Seacart 30 Trimaran competed in the multihull A class and ‘Riptide‘, the Beneteau 49 competed in the CRCA ‘Gold’ Cruising class. Between starts we enjoy some great Hors d’oeuvre’s supplied by Adam Werblow (Director of the Waterfront & Head Sailing Coach), a yearly ritual at the start. It is always a beautiful sight to see all the boats heading to St. Mary’s spreading out all over the Bay! Simultaneously 22 boats were started on the Potomac Leg at Dahlgren and 4 boats started on the Southern Leg at the mouth of the Rappahannock River.

Once starts were over in Annapolis we motored back into the sunset where we all drove separate vans and cars home, returning them back to SMCM for the crews of ‘Sundog’ and ‘Riptide‘. Once at SMCM we unloaded the van & prepared the Race Committee items for the Dove. After checking the ‘Kattack’ tracker feeds, we took the items out to the ‘Dove’ around 10 pm. The Waterfront staff came on around midnight and hung the lantern on the cross at Church Point as the St. Mary’s River Yacht Club boarded the ‘Dove’to begin Race Committee duties. Waterfront staff then helped organize the boats on the dock as they arrived, doing whatever they could to keep things flowing smoothly. Saturday morning Adam Werblow was here early, texting me with questions about the computer aboard the Dove by around 6:30 am- I was already on my way to pick up some donuts to take to the ‘Dove’.  I went to the ‘Dove’ and began to enter finishing times into the scoring site at YachtScoring.com. It has been my privilege to enjoy breakfast with Captain Gates and the crew of the ‘Dove’, who are indispensible to the Race Committee at the finish!

Coming ashore early to prepare the final scoring, calculate the special awards, and create the script for presentation to the crowd consumes my time every Gov Cup Saturday, I’ve been known to disappear to an undisclosed location to do that. This year I had tremendous help from Jay Tyson of the Chesapeake Racer Cruiser Association. If it had only been the traditional PHRF rating and scoring system it would have been a breeze- but we added ORC scoring to the event. ORC stands for Offshore Racing Congress and is the most widely used rating system in the world- but using it here is a brand new idea.  This time is always stressful- I am like a cat on a hot tin roof until the Awards ceremony begins… I can finally relax once the awards have been determined. After enjoying the party until around 10:00 pm I chased the last of the people out of the River Center so I could lock up and go home!

Though I’ve been trying to get away since Monday, I’ve just today finished enough to say I’m starting some time off!

So what where the results?    To make it as fair as possible, the boats are scored using handicapping systems- 3 different systems were used to score various parts of the Gov Cup this year!  SunDog, skippered by Director of Sailing, Bill Ward, was the first boat from Annapolis to arrive in St. Mary’s City, however it is also rated the fastest multihull on the Bay so they finished 3rd on corrected time. Awards are given on corrected time. Riptide placed 2nd in the CRCA “Gold” Cruising Class.

For a historic write up of the annual event and more race results visit: https://dev.smcm.edu/events/govcup/