The MC Fleet invaded the Savannah Yacht Club the weekend of July 8, 9 2000 for their Firecracker 2000 Regatta. Charleston and Augusta provided eleven boats and two folks from Savannah in borrowed boats comprised the fleet. Of note, John Porter sailed number 839 (JBW) to second place in his first regatta in the boat. Also of note is that Tommy Harken forgot to win every single race, he won only four of the six races. Trish Rutan of Augusta was in her first out of town regatta. Even though she did not complete a race, we applaud her for showing up and giving it a try. She did not turn over or wreck the boat. You have to start somewhere. Congratulations.

The racing took place in various conditions of wind and tide. The Saturday were from 7 to 15 mph. The race course was very interesting on Saturday due to the fact that the course covered a "T" shaped course due to the convergence of two rivers, the Wilmington and the Skidaway. The fleet enjoyed the double triangle, windward, leward course. The second reach was a beam reach and most of the time the boats were skipping along on nice planes. The first two races were l o n g ones. The third of the day was a single triangle with a windward leward. All the finishes in this regatta were to leward, which is different for us.

On Sunday the winds were lighter at around 4 to 10 mph. During the race the places changed quite often and quite a bit. Playing the right side upwind against the tide proved interesting and tedious at times. Everybody learned two good lessons about sailing in swift tides and wind that would come and go. Rule 1: don’t dare tack if you are going slow. Rule 2: don’t dare cross the tide unless you are in a good fresh puff.

It was great to be in Savannah. The race committee did a great job. Many prospective MC sailors took demo sails. There might be as many as five folks in the Savannah area who are interested in racing MC’s. All our MC sailors did a great job of showing the boat and showing what a great time we have racing.