Ivanpah Speed Trials November 2000

This years speed trials were far from a blowout but a good time was had and some impressive speeds were turned in.  Wednesday featured great wind 50 miles to the west but a nice light day on the lake.  On Thanksgiving we had 8-12 mph winds and ran a few informal races.  Friday was a day for fraternizing with almost no wind.  Saturday had a few hours of 10 to 15: enough for speed trials with both the big boats and, in the diminishing afternoon wind, with several Stiletto radio controlled boats.  Robert Weber has procured a new set of perpetual speed trophies that are to be presented to the fastest sailors in different classes.    These trophies are to replace a similar set NALSA had in the 1980’s.  We have decided to start over on the class records to give reasonable targets to shoot for.  If we have a little more wind next time it will be easy to increase the records set this year.  We will continue to have an organized speed trial in late November but may have speed trials at other events if the proper conditions present themselves.
This year Dennis Bassano was fastest overall with a 59.4 mph.  Several of the boats made enough runs to get a reasonable guess at the average boat speed/wind speed ratio.  Again Dennis was on top with an average of 4.5.  Terry Fulbright came in second with a 4.5, also taking the top class V honor with 48.9 mph.  Howard Haupt won class IV with 50.9 mph.  The complete results are available in a .pdf  (Adobe Acrobat) format HERE.
Sunday was featured little wind until the end of the day when a light sailing breeze filled, making a fitting end to a nice weekend.  Terry and Floyd White did an excellent job organizing and putting on the event.

Bob Shcumacher and I arrived a couple weeks early with high hopes for big wind for the Iron Duck.  We had one run at about 74 mph early in our stay but that was the last time the boat moved.  This speed game is, in reality, mostly a waiting game.

Bob Dill