Eamonn Delisser and his team on the J\/24 Main Squeeze started off strong with four first-place finishes. This is Delisser\u2019s first time competing at the Helly Hansen NOOD Regatta in the J\/24 class (he\u2019s sailed many NOODs on a different boat), and he pragmatically summed up today\u2019s conditions as shifty. \u201cThe breeze would go left, but you could still get out of a right shift. It didn\u2019t matter where you went because it [the breeze] was going to come back,\u201d Delisser says. \u201cWhile we don\u2019t normally have the boat speed, we certainly had it today so I can\u2019t argue.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
Tomorrow, says Delisser, will be a different day, however. \u201cTruth be told,\u201d he says, \u201cas the day got lighter, our competition got faster\u2026.I was better in the heavy stuff; they were better in the lighter stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
For John Bauman and his team on the Lightning, Raging Bull, boatspeed and conservative tactics paid dividends. \u201cI would rather sail conservatively than pull a high-risk move,\u201d Bauman says. \u201cGiven there are no throwouts for this event, I\u2019m glad we played it the way we did because we ended the day with three second places. My crew [Fred Strammer and Monica Morgan], who are much better than me, wanted to be more aggressive, but I tried to hold them back a little bit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhen it comes to sailing, I\u2019m an idiot savant. Because I have such a great crew, it allows me to ignore everybody and just focus on the telltales and going fast. The more I can trust the crew and drive the boat, the better we are.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
While many of the teams lamented about the light-wind spots that peppered the racecourses in between much larger puffs, one team quickly adapted to capitalize on the changeable conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
Paul Perry, who\u2019s calling tactics for Kevin Holmberg on board the Tampa-based Sonar Fawkes, says he noticed early on that every time there was a puff, there was a wind shift to the east. \u201cWe started scanning to see also where the holes [light spots] were that we could use strategically,\u201d Perry says. \u201cSince we had more than enough power, we would find the lulls in the course and use them to get back across the fleet.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
The strategy and execution is working, as the team leads PHRF 3 with three first-place finishes today. The duo have sailed together for two years and Perry says he and Kevin have established great communication between them. \u201cToday we decided to sail our own race. Playing the fleet was secondary,\u201d Perry says. \u201cThe majority of our success was keeping our heads out of the boat, sailing fast and not missing shifts. And it seemed to work out OK for us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n For Gary Schwarting and his Obsession team, currently leading the Melges 24 fleet, today was about much more than racing sailboats, as he and fellow sailors paid tribute to their friend and fellow Melges 24 sailor, George Haynie, who passed away earlier this week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n \u201cMany of the Davis Island [Florida] sailors gathered together on the water and organized a toast to George,\u201d Schwarting says. \u201cGeorge was one of my best friends and he\u2019s done more for the sport of sailing in this area than anyone I know. We sailed against each other and with each other for over 20 years in Melges 24s; he is already so missed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n Racing resumes for the fleets at 10 a.m. tomorrow, with the addition of the North Sails Doublehanded Distance Race and the Cruising World Rally fleets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n Gusty winds and swinging shifts made for a tricky and physical day for the NOOD racers on Tampa Bay. While sun shone, many teams cashed in a winter full of Florida sailing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":51274,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"BS_author_type":"BS_author_is_guest","BS_guest_author_name":"Laura Muma","BS_guest_author_url":"","hydra_display_date":"20210403","hydra_display_updated":false,"_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":"157","_yoast_wpseo_metadesc":"Gusty winds and swinging shifts made for a tricky and physical day for the NOOD racers on Tampa Bay. While sun shone, many teams cashed in a winter full of Florida sailing.","_yoast_wpseo_title":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","arc_story_id":"LOUL4YXHORGXDOIEYKHM6UZRPQ","arc_website_url":"story\/nood-regattas\/fresh-start-to-the-helly-hansen-nood-st-petersburg\/","custom_permalink":"","arc_subtype":"right-sidebar","arc_exclude_from_feeds":false,"sponsored":false,"sponsored_label":"Sponsored Content","sponsored_display_label":false,"sponsored_image":0,"post_right_rail":true,"post_right_rail_ad_1":true,"post_right_rail_ad_2":true,"post_right_rail_ad_3":false,"post_right_rail_ad_4":false,"post_right_rail_recirc":true,"fixed_anchor_ad":true,"post_top_ad":true,"post_off_ramp":true,"post_taboola":false,"labels":false,"apple_news_api_created_at":"","apple_news_api_id":"","apple_news_api_modified_at":"","apple_news_api_revision":"","apple_news_api_share_url":"","apple_news_coverimage":0,"apple_news_coverimage_caption":"","apple_news_is_hidden":false,"apple_news_is_paid":false,"apple_news_is_preview":false,"apple_news_is_sponsored":false,"apple_news_maturity_rating":"","apple_news_metadata":"\"\"","apple_news_pullquote":"","apple_news_pullquote_position":"","apple_news_slug":"","apple_news_sections":"\"\"","apple_news_suppress_video_url":false,"apple_news_use_image_component":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[157],"tags":[181,311,177,94],"class_list":["post-70134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-regatta-series","tag-helly-hansen-sailing-world-regatta-series","tag-helly-hansen-sailing-world-regatta-series-st-petersburg","tag-racing","tag-st-petersburg"],"acf":[],"apple_news_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70134"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70134\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"2021](\"https:\/\/www.sailingworld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/210402__NAUTICAL_IMAGES_0208_TODD-1024x683.jpg\")
<\/div>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n