Race Results -

December 7, 2008

Eleven boats in driftathon

By Karen Earnshaw

The fastest boat around the course (on uncorrected time) in Sunday’s Mieco Beach Yacht Club race was the canoe from Waan Aelon in Majel (Canoes of the Marshall Islands) called EZ WAM and skippered by Ken Taggart and crewed by Mentil Laik, Bello Shoniber, and Enos Helbous.

The word ‘fastest‚‘ however, hardly applied as the 10 yachts and one canoe drifted around the shortened course with winds pushing them along mostly at just one or two knots. One spectator viewing the start from the Marshall Islands Resort (MIR) commented later that for a while it was “a bit like watching grass grow.”

The boats were split into two divisions: monohulls and multihulls, with the latter starting 10 minutes after the first group.

Traditionally, the yachts sail from the start line off the MIR, then north to the Kalmar Latak’s anchored ships near Ejit, and then west to the dolphin that marks a reef in the center of the lagoon off Enemanet. Then it’s back to the start/finish line to make a course of about 11 miles.

With only light puffs of wind, that course would have left yachts still on the course after dark, so race controller Jerry McGraw chose to have the yachts do a shorter loop from the MIR to Kalmar’s ships and back.

First to cross the line in the monohull division was the yacht Seal skippered by Cary Evarts, who also won on corrected time.

Other placings, also on corrected time, were:

Second: Sand Dollar, Ken Stuber
Third: Sequester, Ted Cary
Fourth: EZ WAM, Ken Taggart
Fifth: Deviant, Chuck Handy
Sixth: Po’Oino Roa, Kathy McGraw
Seventh: Ursa Minor, Bryan Lane
Eighth: Shambala, Keill Price
Ninth: Holokai, Spike Jackson
Tenth: Hanoah, Roger Wilson
Eleventh: Irish Melody, Dave Allen.

Following the driftathon, skippers and crews floated across to the clubhouse (a.k.a. the MIR) to enjoy a great after-race awards party, which was greatly enhanced by a ton of gifts from the club’s many generous sponsors.


Captions: (please click on link to open picture)

1. Canoe EZ WAM