2009 Race Week a success

Note: Nostalgia is a wonderful thing, especially about memorable sailing experiences, but I must apologize for the inadvertent running of my last year's Charleston Race Week column in Friday's edition of The Post and Courier. What follows is the correct column:

Charleston Race Week 2009 was the biggest and best ever. We've talked for years about Charleston's growing reputation as a sailing destination. Last week proved that.

Having been a spectator for two days and a participant for one, I am handing the first very random On The Water Awards based on what I observed. And the winners are:

Best Organizer and Coolest Under Pressure — Meaghan Van Liew, SC Maritime Foundation. Husband, Brad, has lent his international sailing reputation to this event and helped put it on the map, while Meagan handled all the details. There's nothing she hasn't thought of. The growth of this event in participation and reputation is due in large part to all the first-class shore events Meagan incorporated into Race Week.

Best Boat Art — the J/80 Lucky Frog, owned by Ben Schwartz from Bay Shore, N.Y. It had a large, bright green frog on each side of the hull along with the name. Creative and easy to spot.

Best Finish By a Local Boat — Dick McGillivray's J/130 Gone, which is a spinnaker class boat but raced without it in the non-spinnaker class and won handily. McGillivray hardly needs more silver for his trophy case, but it's good to see someone who has given back so much to the sport he loves come out on top.

Best Crew Outfits — Charleston sailor Cal Huge's new Archambault 40RC Jubilee had great looking grey and blue shirts and jackets bearing Jubilee's mascot, an eagle. Among other crew, Huge had OSASailing.com owner Ned Goss and local North Sails loft owners George and Peter Durst sailing on Jubilee — all easily spotted among the thousand or so other participants in the race village wearing their super-sharp Jubilee crew outfits.

Best White Knuckle Moment (That Ended Well) — The best close call I saw in Friday's heavy air was Charleston's David O'Reilly bringing his Melges 24 into the crowded weather mark on port tack, crossing one starboard tack bow, tacking to starboard, squeezing between two oncoming boats while going the opposite direction against fast oncoming traffic. Then O'Reilly did a perfect tack with oncoming boats bearing down on him and safely rounded the mark. No collision, no protest.

Most Polite & Impressive Young People — The College of Charleston sailors I met and chatted with in the race village. As members of one of the most highly regarded collegiate sailing programs in the country, these young sailors get lots of invitations to crew. To a person, the ones I met and spoke with in the race village were some of the most polite, appreciative young people I have met in a long time. Kudos to the College of Chareleston for bringing such classy student-athletes to the Holy City.

Sea Island YC Regatta

Sea Island Yacht Club at Rockville will hold its Spring Regatta on May 16. This is an open regatta and three boats constitute a class. The cost is $10 per single-handed boat, $15 per crewed boat. The first race is at 12:30 p.m. The event has been moved from Memorial Day to foster better participation.

Reach Will Haynie at willh@thepickledish.com.