May 12, 2024 • 26 mins
Jibe talks gets to talk with Don Carsten, Josh and Veronica. We ask them about their winning season at the JRSC and Don talks about the coming Catalina Nationals in Michigan! Come out and watch Rumb Runner shoot for another championship season on Thursday night racing at the Jolly Roger Sailing Club.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Well, welcome to another edition of Jolly Rogers podcast.
(00:04):
We're here today to talk to the winning spring series champs,
the winning fall series champs,
the winning team of everything that was possible to win
at Change of Watch.
The only thing they didn't give them
were the keys to the club, but I guess they could do those.
So I'm gonna let everyone here introduce themselves,
(00:26):
and we'll start with this handsome gentleman to my right
and what is your name?
I'm Josh.
All right. Joshua.
All right, well, you can go by Josh.
You don't have to be Joshua.
Yeah.
And then you, sir?
Don Karustin.
I'm Veronica Amaya.
Veronica is the shy one in the group.
So you guys have gotten to crew with Don this summer.
(00:49):
I'm gonna talk to you young people first.
How do you like that?
I really like it.
Yeah?
I'm glad you said that or you won't get a ride anymore.
Maybe I will.
I won every race with him so far, all because of him.
And then he's also been teaching me
how to sail on my own too.
(01:11):
I think for the last three or four races,
I sailed on the Excite and FJ for the races.
Okay.
And I did pretty good.
I think I got third place with my Excite in second.
And then I also sailed on the FJ
with another person named Tom.
And we did good.
I did good with him too.
What about you?
(01:31):
Well, me getting set up with Don
was probably like the most random thing ever.
I had sailed probably almost about two years ago now
for the first time on Ted's boat.
And I absolutely loved it.
And it was towards the end of the summer.
And he was just like,
well, I got somebody that you could race with.
So I came here one night, played trivia,
and Don was here as well.
(01:53):
And he was just like, Don, I got some new crew for you.
And then a few weekends later,
Don called me to help set his boat up.
And then I started sailing with him every single Thursday,
especially in the summer.
I told work that I could not be there.
And I fell in love with it.
I've learned so much and it's very calming.
And I've noticed that like,
(02:13):
I always just have like the biggest smile
when I come off of the water.
I just absolutely love it.
You're hooked now for life.
Yes.
When you get a man,
you're gonna have to get a man that has a boat.
Oh yeah.
You notice there was no,
what's it like crewing with two youngsters, Don?
I've pretty well done that most of my life
with my own kids and picking up juniors here and there
(02:36):
once in a while.
But these guys are really good learners, fast learners.
And a lot of real pleasant to be around.
Can't say that about a whole lot of kids anymore these days,
but I got a lot of respect for these two.
Good.
Did they ever get to run the tiller?
(02:56):
Occasionally.
Oh, at least he's honest.
Only if we're winning and if we're going downwind.
So what are your jobs on the boat then?
What do you guys do?
I'm a trimmer.
You're the trimmer?
And also go up on the front of the boat to put the jib up.
Okay.
Or just anything.
Okay. What do you do?
I've done just about everything on Don's boat now.
(03:18):
I'll set the boat up.
I'll also do the trimming.
Like I said, occasionally he'll let me do the tiller.
If you're far enough ahead.
Yeah, if we're far enough ahead,
I get to do the tiller.
Sometimes I'm just doing the clock,
but it's honestly just all the experience.
I feel like I've learned something
every time I've went out.
Now have you ever hit anything
when you've been on the tiller?
(03:39):
No, not that I can think of.
Has Don ever run into any of that?
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
100%.
Well, let's hear about that.
Oh, well, you know, it was a very, very hot day
and we were out there for hours.
This sounds like a big story.
You know, it was a hot day once upon a time.
And we jumped into the water.
(04:00):
It was so hot.
And I was scared that we were going to lose Josh
cause he couldn't get back onto the boat.
So what happened?
As soon as I jumped off the boat,
cause Don pushed me off the boat.
I can't imagine he did that.
I could never imagine that.
But after he pushed me off, there was a gust of wind.
So they moved forward.
They had to take the sails down so I can swim back
(04:23):
cause I couldn't swim fast enough.
So what, what did you run into?
Some rocks after being on the water
for probably about four hours.
You finally made it to Turtle Island.
I actually have a really nice picture of Turtle Island.
And then shortly after that, we crashed into the rocks.
But luckily there was like these really nice jet skiers
that were on Turtle Island as well.
(04:44):
And they helped pull us off of the rocks.
And then eventually they told us far enough
that I believe it was Neil that came and saved the day.
And he towed us back to the club.
Neil came out.
Well, we called him on the phone.
It was a real light-air day.
And we knew he was leading.
(05:06):
He was the only one we knew was left in the race
other than us.
So I called him up and he motored out and picked us up
and towed us back.
Broke the gudgeon on the rudder.
So I had to hang onto the rudder
trying to steer it coming back.
Yeah.
But we had to fix for the next Thursday night race.
(05:28):
Which you probably won, right?
We did.
That's not a big surprise.
Yeah, that's a problem when he gets light air.
That can really affect some stuff people don't understand.
That can be worse.
Cause you got no steerage.
Right.
You're just drifting around under the hot sun.
Josh was walking back and forth,
he was trying to figure out where to jump in the water.
(05:49):
Cause I told him, he asked if he could jump in.
I said, yeah.
So he's walking back and forth.
Where should I jump in?
Where should I jump in?
Where should I jump in?
I said, push him, it's right here.
He said, just go.
His eyes about came out of his head when he went in.
Do you have a video on that, Veronica?
I wish I did.
(06:09):
I mean, I can see it clear as day in my head though.
But it was pretty hot that day.
It was.
It was pretty hot.
I think the only downfall of jumping in
was I had wet socks for the rest of the time.
Why didn't you take your socks off first?
Cause I really didn't think about that, honestly.
What do you have socks on in the boat anyway?
(06:31):
Cause I had my shoes on and then I just took my shoes off
but I guess didn't think to take my socks off.
Don didn't teach you about don't jump in the water
with your socks on?
Unfortunately no.
There are some basic lessons in life that I don't teach.
So what's your success for winning all those races
on the river?
(06:52):
It's Don.
It's all Don?
You're not doing anything?
You guys are helping.
I think he's really good at-
He tells us what to do.
He tells us what to do.
But I think towards the end of the season,
we got really good at knowing when to trim the sails in
and when to let them out.
So I think we've, I also learned how to read water.
(07:12):
That was pretty cool.
I knew when a puff of wind was coming.
That takes a little while to figure out, doesn't it?
I mean, I know you've done it for so long, but-
It's just natural for me to do it anymore.
But I mean, I know, I know I never could figure that out
either and then I don't know, finally this last summer,
(07:33):
even myself, I was out with some people.
I said, we got to, we got to move out.
What?
Cause we were just sailing around.
We weren't racing.
I said, there's no, there's some wind out there.
We can go, you know, and then we get into the wind.
But it always amazes me how it's all banded when it's light,
you know, when the wind's light, how you can have nothing.
Then you go like 50 yards and you got a little bit
and it's like such a narrow band and then it goes back.
(07:55):
Of course this river is just, the wind can change what?
Five times and like-
It bends around corners, out here on the river.
And then we have some big trees that really mess things up.
Yeah, yeah, that is true.
That is true.
The tree.
Yeah, the tree.
The tree?
The tree.
The wind eating tree.
Yeah, we all know that tree.
So what's the craziest thing that happened
(08:17):
out here this summer?
Not the wreck thing, I mean, but during Thursday nights.
Well, it wasn't a-
It doesn't have to be a Thursday.
I would say it wasn't a Thursday,
but it was the Cattail Regatta.
And it was actually like, it was my first one
and it was so windy.
Well, I mean, that was probably nothing like,
but it was like what I'm,
(08:38):
it was my second time being on a boat.
And I just remembered the boat would heel over
and I was just trying to crank the sail trim.
Or, why?
I can't remember what they're called.
Winch.
Yeah, the winch.
Winch it too fast, y'all.
For sure.
And I'm just like halfway into the water,
(09:00):
I got the worst and I never burn ever,
but I got the worst sunburn of my life.
But it was fun.
I had a really good stake after, but-
They throw a good party down there.
That was probably one of the craziest days on the water
because we were, we were heeling over pretty crazy.
(09:21):
So Don, the National Catalina 22s
are coming this year to Michigan.
Tell us about some of your,
tell us about your winning.
How many times have you won the Nationals?
The 22 Nationals, one time in the general,
both class and one time in spinnaker class.
(09:42):
Okay.
And I've won Nationals in three other classes,
two other classes.
What do you get when you win that?
They give you a flag?
Trophies, flag.
Flag trophies, yeah.
Nationals is usually some kind of a keepsake trophy
and then they've got a big four foot tall trophy
that they engrave your name on
that stays around forever.
(10:05):
Then did you have the same crew on each time
or was it a different crew each time?
Pretty much a different crew every time.
When we did the Spinnaker Nationals,
we were out in California for that.
I had to fly my crew out for that.
Half the crew, the other half drove the boat out.
And then on the way back,
the crew that took the boat out flew home
(10:29):
and the crew that flew out drove the boat home.
Where did you have to take the boat back to?
We were in California, Mission Bay, San Diego.
That's where, but how did you get the boat out to San Diego?
We towed it out.
Oh, okay.
It's a long drive.
It's a long way.
It is a long way to tow your boat.
(10:49):
Yeah, a couple thousand miles.
Was it the Rum Runner?
Yeah.
How long have you had that boat?
Since about 78.
Now those of you who have never seen the Rum Runner,
if you would see it, just look at it,
you would say, I'm not going on that boat.
First time I went out with Don,
like he was asking the guy crew to give him duct tape.
(11:13):
And I was like, oh my gosh.
Then I go down below and he says, don't step there.
You might go through the bottom.
And I'm thinking, what did I sign up for?
And then I said, we won every time.
I was like, wow, this isn't what I thought.
Pull on that little line up there.
You know, he has those little lines.
I don't even know what those are for.
What they look like strings or?
(11:35):
No, no, pull that one.
You pulled it too much.
I'm like, so yeah, it's amazing.
But when you look at your boat,
but you stripped everything out of it,
that's just weight, right?
It's totally class legal.
I know.
But yeah, I stripped all the excess stuff
that we don't need because it is weight.
And what we do have on the boat that we need,
(11:57):
such as running lights, the clamp on portable kind
for like dinghies and so on.
And I put them down in the middle of the boat
right down in the cabin.
So it's compressing the weight to the middle of the boat.
And the engine doesn't run.
Well, sometimes.
But you have to have an engine, right?
Yeah, has to have it for weight.
(12:20):
If you don't have an engine that,
I think the minimum weight is 40 pounds.
So if you don't have a, if you got a two pound outboard,
you have to put corrector weights on the back of the boat.
So that equalizes things out.
Okay.
It does run though?
Yeah.
Not when we needed it to.
(12:41):
I've never seen it run.
I remember docking with,
that's the thing, your experience, you can dock.
I know you don't even need the engine.
Yeah.
I was told a long time ago,
I was sailing with a friend that had a 35 footer
that we had brand new boat.
First we got it, we were sailing it in.
(13:02):
And he had to leave Saturday night,
had a family emergency, but he said,
go ahead and take the boat out.
When you're, I said, well, what about docking it
when we get back?
Just take it slow.
So if you do bump something,
it doesn't scratch too hard, too much.
And okay.
So that's basically what we do, just bring it in slow.
(13:25):
And rock the boat.
With no engine?
Or did that have an engine?
Well, it had an engine, but,
or it wasn't working at the time.
Yeah.
I think that's a sailboat thing.
Yeah.
So what is it like when you go to a national?
Like how many boats, how many people are there?
(13:48):
Depends on where it is.
First couple of-
How many will be up here in Michigan when they have?
I would guess 30, 35.
But it's fallen off, because back in the heyday,
when we sailed in New York the first time in Chesapeake,
we were looking at 60 boats on the start line.
That's a lot of boats in the same class.
(14:09):
That's a lot of boats, long start line.
35's a lot in the same class on the start line.
Yeah.
Now to win, is it a series of races or is it one race?
How does that work?
Just series.
In our class we run actual national championship races
(14:29):
are Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.
They usually run two to three races a day.
Oh.
Yeah.
So it's quite a grueling-
So you're running probably eight to 10 races.
Yeah.
And that's how they determine the winner
based on aggregate points?
Right.
Low point, because they give you one point for each place.
(14:49):
First place it gets one point,
second place gets two points and so on.
It used to be first was three quarters of a point,
little bonus there, but it's not that way anymore.
So like how many, like let's say your first
national championship, how many first places did you get?
(15:10):
Just approximately.
That was 25 years ago.
Out of the seven race series,
we probably got five first places.
That's pretty darn good.
And then when we won the Genoa class,
there were 28, 29 boats in the class.
And we had to finish within one boat of the boat
(15:36):
that was ahead in that race,
that last race of the regatta.
And we pulled it off, which was an exciting story
because coming into the start line,
I tacked a little too close to another boat.
And I followed them.
So right off the bat, we ended up doing a 720
(15:57):
to exonerate ourselves.
Well, we got to the weather mark,
we were like 18th place.
And we're going downwind, we were sailing long.
We picked up about four or five boats coming downwind,
went back upwind a second time,
picked off another four or five boats,
(16:17):
coming downwind a second time,
picked off more boats.
By the time we got to the Lourdes mark,
we were third place from 18th down to third.
And all we had to do was finish.
We couldn't let any more boats between us,
just one boat between us and the leader of that race.
(16:39):
And we picked him off.
And so we ended up with a second in that race
and ended up winning the Nationals.
It was quite exciting.
That does sound pretty exciting.
So then how long is it, like when you have a 22,
like how long are the races, like the actual race,
(17:00):
how long does it last, each race?
They try to keep them about an hour.
Okay, so it's not too bad.
Hour and a half.
Okay.
Yeah.
Of course, depending on the wind speed and...
Yeah.
There's a lot of variables to it, as with anything in sailing.
Josh keeps asking the question,
Don, what about, that depends.
My standard answer with him is,
(17:21):
that depends on such and such.
Now, can anybody enter the National 22s
or do you have to have so many races under your belt
or how does that work?
As far as being experienced, it doesn't really matter.
You can walk off the street
the thing that matters is you have to own a boat
(17:41):
or have to own the boat
and have to be a member of the National Association
for 30 days prior to the Nationals.
Then your boat has to measure within limits
to be one design.
So could you possibly go there with a Catalina 22
and it not measure?
(18:02):
How would that work if...
Well, you could do one or two things if it doesn't measure.
And things, measurement things would be like
the whisker pole length,
the black bands on the mast and boom.
Used to be the battens would had to be a certain length.
The sails had to measure within certain parameters.
(18:27):
Now, do they measure your boat when you get there
or is that done prior, like when you get a perf rating?
Depends on what fleet you're coming out of.
Some fleets have a measure at their home fleet.
They'll get a measurement certificate
and all they have to do is show that to the measure
when they get to the Nationals.
(18:48):
And some like here, we don't have a measure anymore.
We can do our own and tie it off on it,
but I'll take all my stuff up and let them measure it.
That way it's not showing any bias.
Yeah, I can see that.
What's the craziest National you ever sailed in?
Where was that?
(19:08):
Craziest.
Bad weather, fast, no weather, no wind, stuff like that.
We've had such a variety of things.
I've sailed so many Nationals, I can't remember each one.
How many have you sailed, do you think?
Probably around 18.
Wow.
(19:28):
That's a lot.
And that's with the Catalina, plus I've sailed other classes,
probably another five or six different classes.
Now, are you always, if you're on a boat,
are you always gonna be on the helm?
On the tiller?
I am what you call a tiller hog.
Once I get the tiller in my hand,
(19:49):
I don't think about anything else.
As far as giving it up or trying to teach or anything,
I'm concentrating on driving the boat.
So if you're gonna race with somebody like that,
you're gonna be on the tiller.
What if they told you no, would you go with them?
Oh yeah.
Okay, okay.
But why would they do that?
(20:10):
I mean, with your experience,
I'm just saying what if somebody was hard headed
and said, ah, I wanna do the tiller.
Well, sometimes it's a class rule, again,
Catalina 25 is a class rule that the owner driver.
Oh.
It's like in the 22s.
And the 123 class that I sailed in,
I think that was owner driver also.
(20:31):
Cause I didn't drive that one, I just trimmed and.
So no one else can drive
or you have to drive a percentage of the time?
You can be relieved temporarily.
Okay.
So if you need to relieve yourself, you can be relieved.
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
Exactly.
So, but you pretty much,
you're gonna run the tiller then, huh?
Yeah.
(20:52):
Yeah.
You said that was the way in the 22s also or no?
Yeah, it is the way in the 22.
You have to be the owner
and a member of the national association and the driver.
So you couldn't borrow somebody's boat and say,
hey, I'm gonna take your boat up there.
You couldn't do that.
You couldn't, I could.
Well, I'm not saying that.
Well, how could you?
Because I'm the owner of the boat.
(21:15):
You're not.
Unless you own a Catalina.
If you own the Catalina 22, we did that before.
We went out to California and borrowed a boat,
chartered one out there
and went and sailed the nationals out there.
How did you do that not owning it?
I owned my own boat.
Oh, so do you just have to own a 22?
You have to own a 22.
(21:36):
It could be derelict sitting on a trailer someplace.
I gotcha.
As long as you have paperwork that says that you own it.
Okay.
I misunderstood that part.
Okay.
Sorry about that.
Well, that's all right.
So if you own a 22, then you can sail a 22.
Yeah.
Okay.
All right.
So are you guys having fun?
Yeah, definitely.
(21:56):
How are you?
100%.
You looking forward to this next season?
Absolutely.
You think you're gonna get another win this year?
100%.
Without a doubt.
I gotta tell you,
you were giving Neil and I such a beating.
Neil took his boat out of the water
to see if there was some kind of growth on it or something.
He was convinced there was something going on.
(22:18):
Oh, the red boat?
Yeah.
I don't know, it was pretty grimy looking
on the bottom of it.
No, I just think we stunk at sailing it.
I think your sister's,
I had to clean her bottom of the boat.
It was filthy.
Yeah.
It was just all brown and black with mud.
So I had to clean it all off.
Even though boats are made to be in the water,
(22:39):
they're allergic to water.
Just know that.
Is that why you don't keep your boat stored in the water?
Yeah.
Yeah.
How much weight does that add by storing it in the water?
Like on your boat,
I know it's a weight thing, right?
That's why you don't store it in the water?
Well, it's a weight plus it keeps it clean
by not storing it in the water.
The only time you see me rubbing on my boat
(23:00):
is the hull when I'm putting the speed coat on.
But does it retain water
by sitting it in the water like that?
Oh yeah.
Fiberglass will absorb water.
So how much weight do you think it saves
by just putting it in on the day of?
It doesn't matter.
It's here that it matters.
I got a psychological advantage over everybody.
(23:25):
And it boosts my psychological.
You just more knowledge.
It's the, you told me a story one time
and I don't think we recorded it about racing,
about how people used to,
you would change boats.
Do you remember telling me about that?
Oh, I don't remember.
(23:45):
Tell me that again.
That was interesting.
We did what we called a round robin race.
We had four Catalinas out there
and the first round would be the owner,
normal crew and the third crew would sail their own boat.
And then we would rotate for the second race,
(24:07):
the owner would move up one boat
and the third crew would move down one boat.
And we round robined four races.
And at the end of four races,
it turned out to be that the guy that normally wins won.
The crew that normally wins won for his crew position.
The boat that normally wins won.
(24:29):
I mean, so it doesn't matter
what piece of equipment you're getting
if you know how to use it.
See, that was the thing that impressed me the most
is that fact that it had to do with the captain
and not necessarily the boat.
Yeah.
Because you know things and you just,
but the thing is you've done this long enough,
(24:49):
you know things you can't even tell people
because you don't even know why you know at this point.
That's right.
You just, I don't know, I just know.
One time I had asked Don a question
and it took him like about two weeks to answer it
because he really had to think about it.
Because he was just like, I don't know,
I just do it so naturally that it took him literally
two weeks to answer the question.
(25:11):
A lot of experience.
Anything else you guys wanna talk about for the season?
I always like talking to the winning crew.
Anything you guys wanna add?
That Don's just an amazing teacher.
I mean, we did a race one time where he had to do
like a 360 I think twice and we still won.
That was.
What did you do that you had to do 360?
(25:33):
Well, one time we hit the mark
and then I think we accidentally cut off Neil.
I'm just remembering.
Yeah.
Yeah?
And then we still won.
Yeah, that's always like salt in the wound
when somebody gets penalized and they still beat you.
It's like, I don't know, that's what I think anyways.
(25:53):
You know, you get penalized and then they still beat you.
All right, well, it was good talking to you guys.
Thank you very much for coming in.
I wanted to hear about your success.
I look forward to seeing you guys on the lake
and seeing the back end of your boat again this year.
Mm-hmm.
Thank you very much.
I'm sure that's what'll happen.
Thank you very much for doing this.
Thank you, Troy.
Well, welcome to another edition of Jolly Rogers podcast.
(00:04):
We're here today to talk to the winning spring series champs,
the winning fall series champs,
the winning team of everything that was possible to win
at Change of Watch.
The only thing they didn't give them
were the keys to the club, but I guess they could do those.
So I'm gonna let everyone here introduce themselves,
(00:26):
and we'll start with this handsome gentleman to my right
and what is your name?
I'm Josh.
All right. Joshua.
All right, well, you can go by Josh.
You don't have to be Joshua.
Yeah.
And then you, sir?
Don Karustin.
I'm Veronica Amaya.
Veronica is the shy one in the group.
So you guys have gotten to crew with Don this summer.
(00:49):
I'm gonna talk to you young people first.
How do you like that?
I really like it.
Yeah?
I'm glad you said that or you won't get a ride anymore.
Maybe I will.
I won every race with him so far, all because of him.
And then he's also been teaching me
how to sail on my own too.
(01:11):
I think for the last three or four races,
I sailed on the Excite and FJ for the races.
Okay.
And I did pretty good.
I think I got third place with my Excite in second.
And then I also sailed on the FJ
with another person named Tom.
And we did good.
I did good with him too.
What about you?
(01:31):
Well, me getting set up with Don
was probably like the most random thing ever.
I had sailed probably almost about two years ago now
for the first time on Ted's boat.
And I absolutely loved it.
And it was towards the end of the summer.
And he was just like,
well, I got somebody that you could race with.
So I came here one night, played trivia,
and Don was here as well.
(01:53):
And he was just like, Don, I got some new crew for you.
And then a few weekends later,
Don called me to help set his boat up.
And then I started sailing with him every single Thursday,
especially in the summer.
I told work that I could not be there.
And I fell in love with it.
I've learned so much and it's very calming.
And I've noticed that like,
(02:13):
I always just have like the biggest smile
when I come off of the water.
I just absolutely love it.
You're hooked now for life.
Yes.
When you get a man,
you're gonna have to get a man that has a boat.
Oh yeah.
You notice there was no,
what's it like crewing with two youngsters, Don?
I've pretty well done that most of my life
with my own kids and picking up juniors here and there
(02:36):
once in a while.
But these guys are really good learners, fast learners.
And a lot of real pleasant to be around.
Can't say that about a whole lot of kids anymore these days,
but I got a lot of respect for these two.
Good.
Did they ever get to run the tiller?
(02:56):
Occasionally.
Oh, at least he's honest.
Only if we're winning and if we're going downwind.
So what are your jobs on the boat then?
What do you guys do?
I'm a trimmer.
You're the trimmer?
And also go up on the front of the boat to put the jib up.
Okay.
Or just anything.
Okay. What do you do?
I've done just about everything on Don's boat now.
(03:18):
I'll set the boat up.
I'll also do the trimming.
Like I said, occasionally he'll let me do the tiller.
If you're far enough ahead.
Yeah, if we're far enough ahead,
I get to do the tiller.
Sometimes I'm just doing the clock,
but it's honestly just all the experience.
I feel like I've learned something
every time I've went out.
Now have you ever hit anything
when you've been on the tiller?
(03:39):
No, not that I can think of.
Has Don ever run into any of that?
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
100%.
Well, let's hear about that.
Oh, well, you know, it was a very, very hot day
and we were out there for hours.
This sounds like a big story.
You know, it was a hot day once upon a time.
And we jumped into the water.
(04:00):
It was so hot.
And I was scared that we were going to lose Josh
cause he couldn't get back onto the boat.
So what happened?
As soon as I jumped off the boat,
cause Don pushed me off the boat.
I can't imagine he did that.
I could never imagine that.
But after he pushed me off, there was a gust of wind.
So they moved forward.
They had to take the sails down so I can swim back
(04:23):
cause I couldn't swim fast enough.
So what, what did you run into?
Some rocks after being on the water
for probably about four hours.
You finally made it to Turtle Island.
I actually have a really nice picture of Turtle Island.
And then shortly after that, we crashed into the rocks.
But luckily there was like these really nice jet skiers
that were on Turtle Island as well.
(04:44):
And they helped pull us off of the rocks.
And then eventually they told us far enough
that I believe it was Neil that came and saved the day.
And he towed us back to the club.
Neil came out.
Well, we called him on the phone.
It was a real light-air day.
And we knew he was leading.
(05:06):
He was the only one we knew was left in the race
other than us.
So I called him up and he motored out and picked us up
and towed us back.
Broke the gudgeon on the rudder.
So I had to hang onto the rudder
trying to steer it coming back.
Yeah.
But we had to fix for the next Thursday night race.
(05:28):
Which you probably won, right?
We did.
That's not a big surprise.
Yeah, that's a problem when he gets light air.
That can really affect some stuff people don't understand.
That can be worse.
Cause you got no steerage.
Right.
You're just drifting around under the hot sun.
Josh was walking back and forth,
he was trying to figure out where to jump in the water.
(05:49):
Cause I told him, he asked if he could jump in.
I said, yeah.
So he's walking back and forth.
Where should I jump in?
Where should I jump in?
Where should I jump in?
I said, push him, it's right here.
He said, just go.
His eyes about came out of his head when he went in.
Do you have a video on that, Veronica?
I wish I did.
(06:09):
I mean, I can see it clear as day in my head though.
But it was pretty hot that day.
It was.
It was pretty hot.
I think the only downfall of jumping in
was I had wet socks for the rest of the time.
Why didn't you take your socks off first?
Cause I really didn't think about that, honestly.
What do you have socks on in the boat anyway?
(06:31):
Cause I had my shoes on and then I just took my shoes off
but I guess didn't think to take my socks off.
Don didn't teach you about don't jump in the water
with your socks on?
Unfortunately no.
There are some basic lessons in life that I don't teach.
So what's your success for winning all those races
on the river?
(06:52):
It's Don.
It's all Don?
You're not doing anything?
You guys are helping.
I think he's really good at-
He tells us what to do.
He tells us what to do.
But I think towards the end of the season,
we got really good at knowing when to trim the sails in
and when to let them out.
So I think we've, I also learned how to read water.
(07:12):
That was pretty cool.
I knew when a puff of wind was coming.
That takes a little while to figure out, doesn't it?
I mean, I know you've done it for so long, but-
It's just natural for me to do it anymore.
But I mean, I know, I know I never could figure that out
either and then I don't know, finally this last summer,
(07:33):
even myself, I was out with some people.
I said, we got to, we got to move out.
What?
Cause we were just sailing around.
We weren't racing.
I said, there's no, there's some wind out there.
We can go, you know, and then we get into the wind.
But it always amazes me how it's all banded when it's light,
you know, when the wind's light, how you can have nothing.
Then you go like 50 yards and you got a little bit
and it's like such a narrow band and then it goes back.
(07:55):
Of course this river is just, the wind can change what?
Five times and like-
It bends around corners, out here on the river.
And then we have some big trees that really mess things up.
Yeah, yeah, that is true.
That is true.
The tree.
Yeah, the tree.
The tree?
The tree.
The wind eating tree.
Yeah, we all know that tree.
So what's the craziest thing that happened
(08:17):
out here this summer?
Not the wreck thing, I mean, but during Thursday nights.
Well, it wasn't a-
It doesn't have to be a Thursday.
I would say it wasn't a Thursday,
but it was the Cattail Regatta.
And it was actually like, it was my first one
and it was so windy.
Well, I mean, that was probably nothing like,
but it was like what I'm,
(08:38):
it was my second time being on a boat.
And I just remembered the boat would heel over
and I was just trying to crank the sail trim.
Or, why?
I can't remember what they're called.
Winch.
Yeah, the winch.
Winch it too fast, y'all.
For sure.
And I'm just like halfway into the water,
(09:00):
I got the worst and I never burn ever,
but I got the worst sunburn of my life.
But it was fun.
I had a really good stake after, but-
They throw a good party down there.
That was probably one of the craziest days on the water
because we were, we were heeling over pretty crazy.
(09:21):
So Don, the National Catalina 22s
are coming this year to Michigan.
Tell us about some of your,
tell us about your winning.
How many times have you won the Nationals?
The 22 Nationals, one time in the general,
both class and one time in spinnaker class.
(09:42):
Okay.
And I've won Nationals in three other classes,
two other classes.
What do you get when you win that?
They give you a flag?
Trophies, flag.
Flag trophies, yeah.
Nationals is usually some kind of a keepsake trophy
and then they've got a big four foot tall trophy
that they engrave your name on
that stays around forever.
(10:05):
Then did you have the same crew on each time
or was it a different crew each time?
Pretty much a different crew every time.
When we did the Spinnaker Nationals,
we were out in California for that.
I had to fly my crew out for that.
Half the crew, the other half drove the boat out.
And then on the way back,
the crew that took the boat out flew home
(10:29):
and the crew that flew out drove the boat home.
Where did you have to take the boat back to?
We were in California, Mission Bay, San Diego.
That's where, but how did you get the boat out to San Diego?
We towed it out.
Oh, okay.
It's a long drive.
It's a long way.
It is a long way to tow your boat.
(10:49):
Yeah, a couple thousand miles.
Was it the Rum Runner?
Yeah.
How long have you had that boat?
Since about 78.
Now those of you who have never seen the Rum Runner,
if you would see it, just look at it,
you would say, I'm not going on that boat.
First time I went out with Don,
like he was asking the guy crew to give him duct tape.
(11:13):
And I was like, oh my gosh.
Then I go down below and he says, don't step there.
You might go through the bottom.
And I'm thinking, what did I sign up for?
And then I said, we won every time.
I was like, wow, this isn't what I thought.
Pull on that little line up there.
You know, he has those little lines.
I don't even know what those are for.
What they look like strings or?
(11:35):
No, no, pull that one.
You pulled it too much.
I'm like, so yeah, it's amazing.
But when you look at your boat,
but you stripped everything out of it,
that's just weight, right?
It's totally class legal.
I know.
But yeah, I stripped all the excess stuff
that we don't need because it is weight.
And what we do have on the boat that we need,
(11:57):
such as running lights, the clamp on portable kind
for like dinghies and so on.
And I put them down in the middle of the boat
right down in the cabin.
So it's compressing the weight to the middle of the boat.
And the engine doesn't run.
Well, sometimes.
But you have to have an engine, right?
Yeah, has to have it for weight.
(12:20):
If you don't have an engine that,
I think the minimum weight is 40 pounds.
So if you don't have a, if you got a two pound outboard,
you have to put corrector weights on the back of the boat.
So that equalizes things out.
Okay.
It does run though?
Yeah.
Not when we needed it to.
(12:41):
I've never seen it run.
I remember docking with,
that's the thing, your experience, you can dock.
I know you don't even need the engine.
Yeah.
I was told a long time ago,
I was sailing with a friend that had a 35 footer
that we had brand new boat.
First we got it, we were sailing it in.
(13:02):
And he had to leave Saturday night,
had a family emergency, but he said,
go ahead and take the boat out.
When you're, I said, well, what about docking it
when we get back?
Just take it slow.
So if you do bump something,
it doesn't scratch too hard, too much.
And okay.
So that's basically what we do, just bring it in slow.
(13:25):
And rock the boat.
With no engine?
Or did that have an engine?
Well, it had an engine, but,
or it wasn't working at the time.
Yeah.
I think that's a sailboat thing.
Yeah.
So what is it like when you go to a national?
Like how many boats, how many people are there?
(13:48):
Depends on where it is.
First couple of-
How many will be up here in Michigan when they have?
I would guess 30, 35.
But it's fallen off, because back in the heyday,
when we sailed in New York the first time in Chesapeake,
we were looking at 60 boats on the start line.
That's a lot of boats in the same class.
(14:09):
That's a lot of boats, long start line.
35's a lot in the same class on the start line.
Yeah.
Now to win, is it a series of races or is it one race?
How does that work?
Just series.
In our class we run actual national championship races
(14:29):
are Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.
They usually run two to three races a day.
Oh.
Yeah.
So it's quite a grueling-
So you're running probably eight to 10 races.
Yeah.
And that's how they determine the winner
based on aggregate points?
Right.
Low point, because they give you one point for each place.
(14:49):
First place it gets one point,
second place gets two points and so on.
It used to be first was three quarters of a point,
little bonus there, but it's not that way anymore.
So like how many, like let's say your first
national championship, how many first places did you get?
(15:10):
Just approximately.
That was 25 years ago.
Out of the seven race series,
we probably got five first places.
That's pretty darn good.
And then when we won the Genoa class,
there were 28, 29 boats in the class.
And we had to finish within one boat of the boat
(15:36):
that was ahead in that race,
that last race of the regatta.
And we pulled it off, which was an exciting story
because coming into the start line,
I tacked a little too close to another boat.
And I followed them.
So right off the bat, we ended up doing a 720
(15:57):
to exonerate ourselves.
Well, we got to the weather mark,
we were like 18th place.
And we're going downwind, we were sailing long.
We picked up about four or five boats coming downwind,
went back upwind a second time,
picked off another four or five boats,
(16:17):
coming downwind a second time,
picked off more boats.
By the time we got to the Lourdes mark,
we were third place from 18th down to third.
And all we had to do was finish.
We couldn't let any more boats between us,
just one boat between us and the leader of that race.
(16:39):
And we picked him off.
And so we ended up with a second in that race
and ended up winning the Nationals.
It was quite exciting.
That does sound pretty exciting.
So then how long is it, like when you have a 22,
like how long are the races, like the actual race,
(17:00):
how long does it last, each race?
They try to keep them about an hour.
Okay, so it's not too bad.
Hour and a half.
Okay.
Yeah.
Of course, depending on the wind speed and...
Yeah.
There's a lot of variables to it, as with anything in sailing.
Josh keeps asking the question,
Don, what about, that depends.
My standard answer with him is,
(17:21):
that depends on such and such.
Now, can anybody enter the National 22s
or do you have to have so many races under your belt
or how does that work?
As far as being experienced, it doesn't really matter.
You can walk off the street
the thing that matters is you have to own a boat
(17:41):
or have to own the boat
and have to be a member of the National Association
for 30 days prior to the Nationals.
Then your boat has to measure within limits
to be one design.
So could you possibly go there with a Catalina 22
and it not measure?
(18:02):
How would that work if...
Well, you could do one or two things if it doesn't measure.
And things, measurement things would be like
the whisker pole length,
the black bands on the mast and boom.
Used to be the battens would had to be a certain length.
The sails had to measure within certain parameters.
(18:27):
Now, do they measure your boat when you get there
or is that done prior, like when you get a perf rating?
Depends on what fleet you're coming out of.
Some fleets have a measure at their home fleet.
They'll get a measurement certificate
and all they have to do is show that to the measure
when they get to the Nationals.
(18:48):
And some like here, we don't have a measure anymore.
We can do our own and tie it off on it,
but I'll take all my stuff up and let them measure it.
That way it's not showing any bias.
Yeah, I can see that.
What's the craziest National you ever sailed in?
Where was that?
(19:08):
Craziest.
Bad weather, fast, no weather, no wind, stuff like that.
We've had such a variety of things.
I've sailed so many Nationals, I can't remember each one.
How many have you sailed, do you think?
Probably around 18.
Wow.
(19:28):
That's a lot.
And that's with the Catalina, plus I've sailed other classes,
probably another five or six different classes.
Now, are you always, if you're on a boat,
are you always gonna be on the helm?
On the tiller?
I am what you call a tiller hog.
Once I get the tiller in my hand,
(19:49):
I don't think about anything else.
As far as giving it up or trying to teach or anything,
I'm concentrating on driving the boat.
So if you're gonna race with somebody like that,
you're gonna be on the tiller.
What if they told you no, would you go with them?
Oh yeah.
Okay, okay.
But why would they do that?
(20:10):
I mean, with your experience,
I'm just saying what if somebody was hard headed
and said, ah, I wanna do the tiller.
Well, sometimes it's a class rule, again,
Catalina 25 is a class rule that the owner driver.
Oh.
It's like in the 22s.
And the 123 class that I sailed in,
I think that was owner driver also.
(20:31):
Cause I didn't drive that one, I just trimmed and.
So no one else can drive
or you have to drive a percentage of the time?
You can be relieved temporarily.
Okay.
So if you need to relieve yourself, you can be relieved.
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
Exactly.
So, but you pretty much,
you're gonna run the tiller then, huh?
Yeah.
(20:52):
Yeah.
You said that was the way in the 22s also or no?
Yeah, it is the way in the 22.
You have to be the owner
and a member of the national association and the driver.
So you couldn't borrow somebody's boat and say,
hey, I'm gonna take your boat up there.
You couldn't do that.
You couldn't, I could.
Well, I'm not saying that.
Well, how could you?
Because I'm the owner of the boat.
(21:15):
You're not.
Unless you own a Catalina.
If you own the Catalina 22, we did that before.
We went out to California and borrowed a boat,
chartered one out there
and went and sailed the nationals out there.
How did you do that not owning it?
I owned my own boat.
Oh, so do you just have to own a 22?
You have to own a 22.
(21:36):
It could be derelict sitting on a trailer someplace.
I gotcha.
As long as you have paperwork that says that you own it.
Okay.
I misunderstood that part.
Okay.
Sorry about that.
Well, that's all right.
So if you own a 22, then you can sail a 22.
Yeah.
Okay.
All right.
So are you guys having fun?
Yeah, definitely.
(21:56):
How are you?
100%.
You looking forward to this next season?
Absolutely.
You think you're gonna get another win this year?
100%.
Without a doubt.
I gotta tell you,
you were giving Neil and I such a beating.
Neil took his boat out of the water
to see if there was some kind of growth on it or something.
He was convinced there was something going on.
(22:18):
Oh, the red boat?
Yeah.
I don't know, it was pretty grimy looking
on the bottom of it.
No, I just think we stunk at sailing it.
I think your sister's,
I had to clean her bottom of the boat.
It was filthy.
Yeah.
It was just all brown and black with mud.
So I had to clean it all off.
Even though boats are made to be in the water,
(22:39):
they're allergic to water.
Just know that.
Is that why you don't keep your boat stored in the water?
Yeah.
Yeah.
How much weight does that add by storing it in the water?
Like on your boat,
I know it's a weight thing, right?
That's why you don't store it in the water?
Well, it's a weight plus it keeps it clean
by not storing it in the water.
The only time you see me rubbing on my boat
(23:00):
is the hull when I'm putting the speed coat on.
But does it retain water
by sitting it in the water like that?
Oh yeah.
Fiberglass will absorb water.
So how much weight do you think it saves
by just putting it in on the day of?
It doesn't matter.
It's here that it matters.
I got a psychological advantage over everybody.
(23:25):
And it boosts my psychological.
You just more knowledge.
It's the, you told me a story one time
and I don't think we recorded it about racing,
about how people used to,
you would change boats.
Do you remember telling me about that?
Oh, I don't remember.
(23:45):
Tell me that again.
That was interesting.
We did what we called a round robin race.
We had four Catalinas out there
and the first round would be the owner,
normal crew and the third crew would sail their own boat.
And then we would rotate for the second race,
(24:07):
the owner would move up one boat
and the third crew would move down one boat.
And we round robined four races.
And at the end of four races,
it turned out to be that the guy that normally wins won.
The crew that normally wins won for his crew position.
The boat that normally wins won.
(24:29):
I mean, so it doesn't matter
what piece of equipment you're getting
if you know how to use it.
See, that was the thing that impressed me the most
is that fact that it had to do with the captain
and not necessarily the boat.
Yeah.
Because you know things and you just,
but the thing is you've done this long enough,
(24:49):
you know things you can't even tell people
because you don't even know why you know at this point.
That's right.
You just, I don't know, I just know.
One time I had asked Don a question
and it took him like about two weeks to answer it
because he really had to think about it.
Because he was just like, I don't know,
I just do it so naturally that it took him literally
two weeks to answer the question.
(25:11):
A lot of experience.
Anything else you guys wanna talk about for the season?
I always like talking to the winning crew.
Anything you guys wanna add?
That Don's just an amazing teacher.
I mean, we did a race one time where he had to do
like a 360 I think twice and we still won.
That was.
What did you do that you had to do 360?
(25:33):
Well, one time we hit the mark
and then I think we accidentally cut off Neil.
I'm just remembering.
Yeah.
Yeah?
And then we still won.
Yeah, that's always like salt in the wound
when somebody gets penalized and they still beat you.
It's like, I don't know, that's what I think anyways.
(25:53):
You know, you get penalized and then they still beat you.
All right, well, it was good talking to you guys.
Thank you very much for coming in.
I wanted to hear about your success.
I look forward to seeing you guys on the lake
and seeing the back end of your boat again this year.
Mm-hmm.
Thank you very much.
I'm sure that's what'll happen.
Thank you very much for doing this.
Thank you, Troy.
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