Just wanted to give a shout out to all the skippers and crews who came out this past weekend for a leisurely weekend of racing on the Berkeley Circle.

Congratulations to Philippe Kahn and the "Pegasus" team on their golden result and for reminding the fleet that most of us still have our work cut out to get to that level of performance. Watching Philippe's crew hiking out upwind made me realize that there are still levels of physical pain I have yet to achieve on the rail.

Lest I give the impression that "Pegasus" simply romped, hats off to Bob Tennant and "Where's Bob?" who made Philippe work hard for his overall win. I confess that I probably spent too much time watching the tough back-and-forth between the two leaders in every race, but it was pretty exciting. "Where's Bob?" never gave up, going at it tack-for-tack up that last windy beat to the finish in race #5, and getting nipped by what looked like no more than a boatlength at the
finish.

We had three guests in from Rush Creek YC (Dallas, TX) on "Flygfisk" (USA 525 / Hull 49) to experience a "typical" weekend of Bay racing in the Melges 24. Fortunately for them we didn't disappoint, with perfect Circle conditions both days, some really close racing, and some epic downwind rides that put grins on everyone's faces.

As always, we learned a lot lining up against our friends on "Full Throttle", "Nothing Ventured" and "Smokin", and were reminded that you cannot spend enough time going boat-on-boat in the Melges 24 if you want to improve and hone your skills.

It looked like there was a bit of damage and some unplanned excitement among several competitors but we didn't get any details and would certainly like to hear from anyone who knows what happened. We were particularly suprised when "Smokin" disappeared, since they had been showing us transom most of the weekend. Very sorry that things went pear shaped.

Hope everyone will be coming out for the Velocitek. When I drove home Sunday afternoon it was nuking over by Tiburon YC and the water looked a lot flatter. Didn't seem nearly as painful as the Circle chop upwind.

Best Regards,

Guy Rittger

"Flygfisk" / USA 525

Bowman