J/80 One Design Racing at the Toronto Area Hospice Regatta
The Toronto Area Hospice Regatta has announced its first ever J/80 start on the north shore of Lake Ontario. The regatta will take place June 16-17, 2012 at the National Yacht Club in Toronto. This year marks the fifth anniversary of this exciting charity and one design sailing regatta, where 100 per cent of the net proceeds are donated to Perram House a palliative care residence in Toronto for individuals who have a limited life expectancy.

| 15 May 2012 | Details and NOR | 

CRW Day 2
Another awesome day, 4 races! RC did a great job managing a fickle gradient wind and the tide dumping out of the Ashley and Cooper Rivers. For the first half is the day, the start was set up in the washing machine between the two, adding another element to the course. The ebbing tide made the for especially fun starts, but the Z flag at the start of R3 got everyone in line. There were no slam dunks today, with lots of position changes from leg to leg, and Kicks, CoolJ, Arrow, and Goose all had very solid days. Day 3, bring it on! But first, party at casa Chadwick...

| 21 April 2012 | 

Charleston Race Week Day 1
Here is a live update from CRW Day 1 on board Gromit:

Epic day 1, 4 races! Played w the ebbing tide for most of the day - our course straddled 2 different currents for the 1st 2 races, which was a huge factor. Gradient battled sea breeze in the AM, then it swung right as the sea breeze filled in midday, nice solid 12+ knots, beautiful. Great RC, great racing - lots of position changes. Kicks dominated, even though they were on the basement at the start of R4 - they did an impressive job clawing back. Great day overall!

Thanks Tina, Ryan and Andy of Gromit! Oh yes - I wish I was there! Stay tuned for more updates tomorrow!
A

| 20 April 2012 | Day 1 results | 

Seattle Sailing Club looking for your help to grow the NW fleet ...
Greetings J/80 Captains,

My name is Joe Cline, I‘m the club manager at Seattle Sailing Club.

We have three J/80s in our Club fleet. They are a member favorite for day sailing, we teach on them constantly, and we are beginning to ramp up opportunities for racing. The fleet in the Pacific Northwest is growing little by little, and there is a lot of enthusiasm about J/80 sailing in this area right now.

Here at Seattle Sailing Club have adequate J/80 sails for day sailing and teaching. But as we expand our racing programs, we are finding that the normal club sails leave our members at an immediate disadvantage, and racing just is not as fun if you do not have a chance to compete. And we do hope to have club crews out for some of the bigger regattas NOOD, District Champs, and Whidbey Island Race Week.

Unfortunately, it is just not in the cards for us to be looking at new sails. I suppose we are hoping to have our cake and eat it too, because we would like to have a few solid racing sails. We are not looking for donations, we are willing to buy a few sails. But, our range is in the hundreds, not the thousands.

Ultimately, we‘d love to find 1-2 race-able mains, 1-3 race-able jibs, and one race-able spinnaker.

Here in Seattle, there is a fleet of 30 competitive J/24s, so it is always easy to locate gently used one-two season sails for our J/24 racers (we have five 24s in the Club). So, since I do not have a big, established fleet here in town, I thought I would just cast a wide net and see whether anybody might be cleaning out a sail locker and willing to part with a decent sail or two for a committed organization. Make us an offer!

Thank you very much, and have a great season!
Joe

Joe Cline
Club Manager
Seattle Sailing Club
7001 Seaview Ave NW #130
Seattle, WA 98117
(206) 782-5100 | joe@seattlesailing.com

| 27 March 2012 | 

San Diego NOOD
The J/80 fleet was greeted with a weekend of epic conditions at the San Diego NOOD Regatta this year. Racing on Friday saw conditions of 6-10 knots of breeze as the race committee conducted three races. After a cold front rolled through the area Friday night, it was breeze on for the rest of the weekend with conditions of 20-25 knots. In the end, it was Curt Johnson and the crew of Avet sailing to a record of four 1st, a 2nd and two 3rds to win the race series. Second was Dan Gribble sailing MONKEY SHOULDER to a 4-4-4-1-2-2-3 to come on strong towards the end of the regatta to secure their position with 20 pts. In a tie-breaker for third place were John Steen on UNDERDOG and Steve Wyman on NUHUNU. In the end, Underdog scored a 2-2-5-7-4-4-1 for 25 pts to beat out the Nuhunu score of 5-3-2-7-1-3-4.

| 22 March 2012 | Results | 

Great day of racing at Bacardi Cup in Miami
Update from Michael Beers: Great breeze - 17-22 kts - and three races today. Wish there had been one more!

| 08 March 2012 | Results of Day 1 | 

Spring Check-list
With many of the J/80s out of the water for the winter, and with several new owners likely having bought used boats in the past year, we thought it would be a good time to remind people of the Best Practices document that is online.

Please make sure you routinely check your boat and have a safe sailing season!

Best regards,
Jeff Johnstone
J Boats, Inc.

| 07 March 2012 | Follow this link to the Best Practices Document | 

The 2013 J/80 WORLDS will be held in Marseille, France (7th-13th of July 2013)
After much consideration, responsibility for the organization of the 2013 Worlds for Frances J/80 Class has been awarded to the city of Marseille and the project put forward by SIRIUS EVENEMENTS. The event will be held from 7 to 13 July.

The reasons behind this decision are numerous :

- A highly professional application which would suggest meticulous organization both on the water and on shore;
- Very substantial involvement from the local authorities;
- A coherent and experienced management team;
- A site of international influence with easy access for both French and overseas competitors;
- A very real desire by local protagonists to use these Worlds as a springboard for the development of J/80 activity in the Mediterranean;
- A highly polished communications strategy.
- A fantastic site, with very promising weather statistics over the period in question;

Ultimately Marseille is a resolutely prestigious site which has been geared up for sailing for many years. Hosting the Louis Vuitton Cup, the Tour de France la Voile and Grade 1 Match Racing, to name but a few such events, this year the city is also a host venue for the MOD70 series... Clearly Marseille is not just a place where you go to lap up the warm sunshine.

The event website will go online over the coming weeks, where you will be able to peruse the first information regarding the 2013 Worlds.

Press contacts
- Ludovic Gilet, President of the French J80 Class, ludovic.gilet@classej80france.com +33 (0)6 07 57 30 40
- Xavier Dubos, head of communications for the French J80 Class, xavier.dubos@free.fr ,+33 (0)6 70 20 50 86
- Manfred Ramspacher, Manager of Sirius Evenements, m.ramspacher@sirius-events.com, +33 (0)6 08 16 98 29

| 05 March 2012 | 

St. Pete NOOD
A competitive contingent of eight boats rocked and rolled in the breezy conditions on Sunday. Many found it to their liking and had some fun planing around on some good puffs and decent waves. The fleet had a good cross section of teams from across the country, from Texas to Wisconsin, Florida to New England. Winning was Fort Worth Boat Club's Ramon Torres sailing 80 PROOF, managing to sail a very consistent 4-1-2-2-1 score for 10 pts and easily win their class. Behind Ramon was a very tough race for the balance of the podium, if not the top five. Second was Gary Panariello hailing from North Shore YC racing COURAGEOUS to a 2-2-3-3-7 for 17 pts. Just one point back in third was local Randy St James sailing for Davis Island YC onboard CLAIRE, managing to sail super-fast on the last day to snag a 6-5-4-1-2 tally for 18 pts. Yet one more point back was Tod Patton from Milwaukee YC sailing BLONDIE to a 7-3-1-4-4 score for 19 pts. And one more point back from him was Ian Torrie from Nepean Sailing Club racing BLIND FAITH to a 3-4-5-5-3 record for 20 pts. Whew! That was a close finish for these four boats on the last day

Photocredit: Photoboat.com

| 25 February 2012 | Final Results | 

...News Archives