Home	Three Bridge Fiasco 1/31/26

We got lucky with a nice day for the five great Islanders - Bella Luna, Cassiopeia, Kapai, Luna Sea and WindCatcher - that participated in this year's Three Bridge Fiasco race on January 31st. Starting and finishing off the Golden Gate YC Race Deck in a pursuit start (slowest boats first), the course includes the Blackaller Buoy, near the south tower of the Golden Gate Bridge, Red Rock, adjacent to the Richmond - San Rafael Bridge, and Treasure Island / Yerbu Buena Island in the middle of the Bay Bridge. Thus the "Three Bridge" part of the name. The "Fiasco" part of the title means that you can cross the start and finish line in any direction, the round any mark in any sequence in any direction. Factor in the current, which this year started on the end of weak flood, but switched to a wicked 4.3 knot max ebb by 1424, and the wind shadows of Angel and Treasure Islands, you've got a perfect tactician's delight (or nightmare!).

The race is divided into Double Handed and Single Handed sections, and further broken down by Spinnaker and Non-Spinnaker entries. Luna Sea entered as DH Spinnaker, with Bella Luna, Cassiopeis and Kapai in DH Non-Spinnaker, and superstar Dan Throop entering WindCatcher in the SH - Non-Spinnaker group.

With good winds for the first time in nearly 10 years (!), most of the fleet finished, and Kapai and Luna Sea each took 3rd in their sections. Below are the start, finish, and elapsed times, and section position. If all were racing together and an allowance included for Spinnaker - Non-Spinnaker ratings, Kapai would probably have been declared the overall winner, finishing the course without a spinnaker just 3 minutes and 2 seconds slower than Luna Sea. But, Luna Sea likely would have saved her time with a 22 minute 10 second lead over Cassiopeia.

Below are the narratives from Kapai and Luna Sea and we'll add any other narratives we get! Enjoy.

From Kapai:
We arrived in the starting area 40 minutes early and saw Kit Weigman and Barney Brickner on Cassiopeia sizing things up. We wished them luck. We next saw Bella Luna with Bob Da Prato getting ready. Bob asked if I had seen Luna Sea which we had not. Bob good naturedly complained that Dan Knox convinced him he needed to participate and then he did not show up! More on this later.

We had about 8 knots of wind out of the NE at the start and a pretty good flood so we went with the current and started on port tack about 50 yards behind Dan Throop on Windcatcher - whose rating had him starting 2 minutes and 6 seconds earlier. There was so much traffic we lost Dan and never saw him again.

Our plan was to head straight to Red Rock which worked out well. We tacked up the left side of the course in the deep shipping channel to take advantage of the dying flood. We rounded Red Rock clockwise and then had a very broad reach to Treasure Island staying in shallow water for ebb relief all the way to the Bay Bridge.

Rounding Yerba Buena we had a huge ebb and 15 knots of wind which got us to Blackaller in no time. Our speed over the ground was 10.5 knots for a while!

We finished at 14:57:20, just in time to see Luna Sea finishing a couple of minutes earlier. I caught a photo of Luna Sea just after they finished. Dan Knox hailed us and told us he was 20 minutes late to the start due to the flood and that he flew a spinnaker.

After the start, and apart from Luna Sea, we never saw another Islander the whole day. Kapai had the big fun! Looking forward to hearing other stories and doing this again next year. Some pics below.
Commodore Egan

Pictures from Kapai. Click on images to enlarge, click "Back" to return.

Cassiopeia

Bella Luna

Trevor on Kapai

Luna Sea after finish.

From Luna Sea:
Quite a day sailing with David on his first Three Bridge Fiasco. So many things happened. Weather projections were for almost no wind and a giant 4.3 knot ebb in the middle of the afternoon. Turned out the wind was just about perfect with a steady 8-15 knots most of the day.

But the tide was indeed ripping. And every decision we made on the course was because of the tide. We got started a bit late and even though we motored the entire way to the start area the flood tide kept us from getting there on time. I gave us an hour and a half to get from Marina Village to the Golden Gate Yacht Club and it just was not enough, and we started 20 minutes late. Ouch.

After turning off the engine and sailing for 15+ minutes we finally made it past the start line, put up the kite and sailed a beam reach to Blackaller. The wind was from the northeast at about 10 knots.

After rounding Blackhaller, we hardened up and sailed close hauled across the bay toward the north tower of the Golden Gate Bridge. After tacking we headed to Red Rock choosing to go south of Angel Island. During this time, we sailed with the go-fast guys and saw no Islanders who we hoped were miles ahead of us. But we were sailing well and no one was passing us and from time to time we would pick up a few places.

The trip to Red Rock was a beat the entire way and given we were using "the old guys 10-minute tack rule" we kept tacks to a minimum and made an easy rounding of Red Rock and put up the kite again. We then had a long port pole reach all the way to the Bay Bridge, jibing just once right before the Bridge. By this time the big ebb was in full effect, and we struggled to make 2.5 knots though the water while doing close to 5-6 knots.

On the way down to the Bay Bridge, we did see Rob and Rob on Bella Luna and then Daniel Throop on Windcatcher. (Always nice to see full sails on Windcatcher.) Both looked very pretty but were very deep in the fleet. Even with our late start we were a good bit ahead of them. It appears they made their decision to go to the Bay Bridge first, but that's all part of the fun of the 3BF.

After we got to the Coast Guard Station at Yuba Buena Island, we dowsed the kite and hardened up to close hauled once again for the trip to the finish line. The big ebb was now in full effect, and we had all we could do to keep from running into the eastern most tower of the Bay Bridge as the wind picked up and we had 15-20 on the nose along with the 4-knot ebb.

After a quick unplanned tack to miss the tower, we were zooming, hitting a few 10's over ground all the way to the finish. The increase in wind speed at this point was a shocker but we carried on and were able to crack off just a bit to a close reach and finish near the pin end.

After we finished with saw Commodore Rick and Trevor on Kapai finished soon after us. Again, Kapai looked great. They had gone to Red Rock first but lacking a kite on the long reach from Red Rock to the Bay Bridge were at a serious disadvantage. We never did see Kit on Cassiopeia but assume they finished way ahead of everyone else. But so much matters on what course they took. If they chose the Bay Bridge first it would have been a tuff slog. Guess we will have to wait and check the results. Just too bad that the I36's didn't have a one design fleet in this race, still 5 boats at the start line is excellent even if they all started at different times.

But very grateful for the SSS for putting on this wonderful regatta and maybe next year we will ask them to score us a fleet. Except for plopping my new iPhone over the side, I had a great time. :)
Happy Sailing! Dan Knox

Enjoy the pics, and here's a link to the video they came from: Luna Sea video.

Luna Sea Chute	LS Bay BR	LS Heads for finish ...	Luna Sea finishes
Kapai after finish.

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