Not sure if there is a race this day, but there should be....   http://www.bartsbash.co.uk/

More Dorade videos on YouTube. It’s not over yet, but due to this atypical weather pattern the S&S 52-foot wood yawl Dorade will likely win the race overall in corrected time, a repeat of her victory in 1936. Impeccably renovated and maintained, her victory may be aesthetically pleasing for the classic boat crowd but will not be a fluke: with a pro-level crew and weeks of sail testing and training, her achievement is the result of having all the right elements of preparation, execution and luck with weather come together. […]

  The chase boat first made contact with Jeanne about 11pm off of Race Rocks.  She had about 7.5 NM to go to the line.  There were light variable winds of about 3 to 7 knots and the flood was just ending.  It took until about 2:30 am to reach the line at the breakwater.  After crossing the line, we took her in tow to the inner harbor and arrived at about 3:00.  Ian Grant from the Ocean Cruising Club and the Royal Victoria Yacht Club was acting as official timer as Tony Gooch was away sailing to Europe.  The [...]

Jeanne Socrates arrived about 2:30 AM local time July 8 in Victoria.

Full screen is better.

via Anarchy

via Pressure Drop

This 47-minute documentary originally aired as part of the "Sea Tales" series on A&E. It tells a little-known story about a band of young yachtsmen and fishermen who were recruited during World War II to help protect the United States' East coast from Hitler's deadly fleet of Nazi U-Boats.  The sailors were sent out to find and confront the U-Boats equipped only with antique machine guns mounted on wooden recreational sailboats that were put into service so quickly the grey paint was still wet when they left the docks. Via the National Sailing Hall of Fame

  26+ knots downwind in a 40 knot breeze, no chute. More at Lectronic Latitude and www.pbyc.org.

Clip La Solitaire du Figaro - Eric Bompard... by lasolitairedufigaro

  Race documents are here.

Capt. Nat's offset machine is even cooler.

Call To Action This is an urgent message from the Recreational Boating Association of Washington (RBAW). Last session, the Legislature raided $3.3M from the boaters’ $9.7M un-refunded gas tax funds (the Recreation Resource Account) that are dedicated to launch ramps and other related water-access projects for boaters around the State. Please email your Legislators now asking them to restore the Recreation Resource Account in the Capital Budget to its dedicated $9.7M level. The process to send emails is easy and just takes a minute. Please click on the link below to log in and send a message to your Legislators. [...]

70 year old, solo circumnavigator Jeanne Socrates passed the halfway mark last week south of Australia. She is on her third attempt at a non-stop, unassisted, engineless rounding. The slides show her leaving Victoria in October. We expect to see her return in late May. Her blog can be found at http://synereida.livejournal.com/ and her position is here.  You may have seen Nerieda refitting at the Boat Haven a couple years ago.

Cajones in the canyons. Full screen please. This day at Teahupoo- Aug 27th 2011 during the Billabong Pro waiting period is what many are calling the biggest and gnarliest Teahupoo ever ridden. Chris Bryan was fortunate enough to be there working for Billabong on a day that will go down in the history of big wave surfing. The French Navy labeled this day a double code red prohibiting and threatening to arrest anyone that entered the water. Kelly Slater described the day by saying "witnessing this was a draining feeling being terrified for other people's lives all day long, it's [...]

Bernard Stamm had a surprise while back on "swim step". This occurred after the start of the Vendee Globe.

French rigger GreementCourant

Day 6 of the Red Bull Youth America's Cup Trials. Looks like they are off of the Oakland-Alameda Estuary, well away from the Gate and the Slot. Via SA.

The Pacific International Yachting Association has updated their minimum equipment standards.  The document can be found here.  These rules are enforced for PIYA US and Canadian sanctioned races.

via Old Salt Blog

More at SeaLaunay.com

After last year's racing tragedies in California at the Farallones and the Coronados,  San Francisco's offshore racing authority has amended its minimum equipment and safety requirements.  The Northern California Offshore Racing Council  (NCORC) document can be found at http://norcalorc.org/safety-draft Notably rule 34 states: The person in charge and at least 30% of the crew (including person in charge) shall attend a US Sailing sanctioned Safety at Sea Seminar within the last 5 years (6.01) (Required by the 2014 season. For 2013 at least one person on board full crew (3+) boats must be certified, single and double handed boats are exempt until 2014) Several Safety at Sea Seminars have been scheduled in the [...]

A local website is offing Salish Sea Pilot Guides for free.  There are two volumes - San Juan Islands and Gulf Islands.  They are offered as PDF documents and can be transferred to almost any device.  You can find them at salishseapilot.com. Via Bitter End Blog.

There is always ocean racing... 2012 Pacific Cup aboard Double Trouble. The Oregon Offshore and Swiftsure are coming up.

  Sailing World has an interesting article outlining the differences between traditional free-flying sail furlers and the new "top down" versions.

Team Tendrisse does Med  events, racing the Longtze sports boat design by Steve Thomson. Really first rate video deserving full screen.   More at tendrisse.com.

Ronnie Simpson has been sailing single handed out of the Bay Area the last 4 or 5 years. He recently went to France to cover the Vendee Globe for Sailing Anarchy. He had been talking about wanting to do the VG since last summer's Single Handed Transpac. Back from France, he has started a fundraising campaign to get a ride in in 2016. More on Sailing Anarchy and at ronniesimpsonracing.com

70 knots of fun.

Some hot racing in Sydney goes awry.