the 2009 Canadian Wayfarer Nationals
Toronto Sailing & Canoe Club * August 8-9
Regatta Report by Uncle Al

A healthy and very well matched fleet of 17 Wayfarers contested our 50th Wayfarer Nationals, hosted August 8-9 by the Toronto Sailing & Canoe Club. After a Saturday morning postponement due to lack of wind, Humber Bay co-operated nicely with gradually building breezes that let our RC give us four beautifully exciting races before a threatening thunderstorm called a halt to Saturday's proceedings with Heider Funck and Tom Wharton holding a slim one-point lead over Al Schonborn and Nick Seraphinoff. When Sunday's weather  proved unsailable due to lack of wind and threatening electrical storms, the series was cut short to Saturday's four races, with the team of Heider and Tom winning their first Nationals since 2001.

Defending champions, Mark and Paul Taylor of the Mississauga SC saw their winning streak cut off at two despite winning the first race in great style. Also of particular note were North Bay's Sue Pilling and Steph Romaniuk who not only won race #2, their first race win in a Nationals, but also took the Sweet Award for the highest finish (4th overall) by a mixed (male-female) team plus a piece of the Most Improved honours which they shared with Thomas Vendely and his son, Dusan. Best parent-offspring honours (the Gillespie Award) once more went to Alastair Ryder-Turner and his son, David who placed 6th overall. The Rookie Trophy went to TSCC's Bob Stevenson and Anthony Khoraych.


Our heartfelt thanks and gratitude go to our hosts, the Toronto Sailing & Canoe Club, most especially our Regatta Chairman, Tom Wharton, and his manager, George Blanchard, whose mind remains sharp as a tack after nine and a half decades of hard use. Thanks also to PRO, Brian MacLennan and his committee which included - among others - Brian Logan, George Blanchard, Anna Wharton, Roy Kobyashi, Gord Nikaido, Richard Evans and Boris Kuzmin. Apologies to anyone I missed. Richard and Boris were also our action photographers for this year's Nats, and did a great job capturing the excitement of the very close racing. Club Manager, Derek Griffiths (above right), and his bar and kitchen staff capably looked after our sustenance, the highlight being Saturday's post-race BBQ dinner where Marc Bennett (above left) once more was our barbecue chef and did great justice to the excellent steak and chicken that was on offer.


In the racing, boats were consistently well sailed and the competition was very close throughout the fleet and the series, too. Little did we realize that when TS&CC's Heider Funck with Tom Wharton spent just about the entire final leg of Saturday's fourth race overlapped with Oakville's Al Schonborn and crew, Nick Seraphinoff of Detroit, that the winner of this race would be the 2009 Canadian champion. Near the finish, Heider headed high for the pin end and pulled away (above) from Al who remained under mistaken impression that the boat end of the finish line was closer. Thus, Heider and Tom took over the series lead (6-2-1-1: 10 points) for the first time, just in time, moving ahead of Al and Nick who ended up scoring 4-3-2-2 for 11 points.

The fight for series 3rd was also very close as four crews ended up within two points of each other. The blue flags ended up going to the Taylor brothers, Mark and Paul, of the Mississauga SC, whose two-year reign as Canadian Wayfarer champions thus came to an end when they scored 18 points off 1-5-7-5 finishes. Only one point behind the Taylors, in a 4th-place tie, were North Bay's Sue Pilling with Steph Romaniuk (7-1-3-8) and TSCC's John Cawthorne with Robert MacDonald (2-9-5-3). Sue and Steph also won other honours as mentioned above. One more point back, in series 6th, were the MSC father-son duo, Alastair and David Ryder-Turner (8-4-4-4). And this marked the fifth straight year that Alastair and one of his sons, David or Andrew, have won the Gillespie Award as the highest placed "parent-child" team.

Marc Bennett of Bramalea and his wife, Julie Seraphinoff, of East Lansing, Michigan, lost all hope of doing better than series 7th when race 4 was started a minute too soon and no one had the heart to request redress from our lovable RC. By the time Marc had sailed over to inform the RC of their timing error and finally started after realizing that nothing would be done, Marc and Julie were so far back that they were lucky to escape with a 10th to add to their previous 5-6-6.

Also not helped by the race 4 timing miscue were North Carolina's Jim and Linda Heffernan who had begun their series with an outstanding 3rd but then fallen to a pair of 8ths. The RC's early start to the finale cost them dearly as they fell to a 12th and thus ended up 8th overall. Still, Jim and Linda enjoyed this first leg of their 2009 Northern Odyssey which saw them "camp out" at the TS&CC for the weekend before moving on towards next weekend's Wayfarer North Americans on Canandaigua Lake via Niagara-on-the-Lake and a bike tour of the Niagara Falls area.

Series 9th went to Toronto's Mike Codd who again sailed George Blanchard's W4600 Red Top with his sailing buddy, Kirk Iredale of Exeter, north of London, Ontario. Kirk and Mike finished two points up on England expatriate, Roger Shepherd, and Raewyn Perry, his very own ex-Kiwi.

Following Roger and Rae in the standings were three teams from the host club: Fred Black was just beginning to get re-attuned to his ace crew, Michael Kachkovski, having progressed through 14-12-9-9 finishes when the series ran out with them in 11th place.


Capturing a significant 12th place were Thomas Vendely and his son, Dusan. Being seeded 15th for this Nationals, the Vendely team matched the crew of Sue Pilling and Steph Romaniuk as this year's Most Improved team - see Thomas on the left above congratulating Steph and Sue.

The standings around 13th place were packed. Locals, Anne and Gary Armstrong, just barely got good old W861, their beloved wooden classic, ready in time for racing this weekend, and just barely edged out Rob Wierdsma and his young son, Daniel, from MSC by a single point to take lucky 13th. Only two points further back were TSCC's David Platt (our CWA Chief Measurer) and his daughter, Jessica. Both the Armstrongs and the Platts had been absent from the regatta scene for some time and were impressively sharp, considering!! Hope we'll see you at more regattas soon, gang!!


Another old wooden classic campaigned at this year's Nationals was W440, formerly owned and sailed out of Ontario Place by Diane Zaremba whom many will fondly recall as our Wayfarer Worlds caricaturist in 1995 and 2004 - see the 2004 photo above where Diane (r) has just immortalized Liz Feibusch and her W10000 Ten Grand.


This year W440 was in the hands of TSCC's Bob Stevenson (r) and Anthony Khoraych who used sail number 3137 and won the Rookie Trophy since this was their first appearance in the Canadian Nationals. Very well done, Bob and Anthony!! We look forward to seeing you at many more Nationals!!


The "perfect hosts" award, one supposes, would have gone to the host club's Ted Lacelle and Jim Kennedy who placed last in each and every race but never even came close to quitting. And as the photo above indicates, Jim and Ted raced in style, flying the spinnaker in conditions that in early versions of our 50 years of Nationals only a few teams would have dared to try.



#1: winds SE, 4 to 6 knots John Cawthorne (3654), Mark Taylor (7673) and Jim Heffernan (2458) made out well by starting at the pin end (above) holding starboard into a slight header and then tacking. The first to tack to port was John Cawthorne who rounded in the lead off the first of a twice-around windward-leeward course with Mark and Jim following a respectable distance behind.  Mark was the only one of the top three seeds to round near the top as Heider and Uncle Al were well back around 10th place.


Mark made his move past John just before the leeward gate (above), and that proved to be decisive, as the leaders began to pull away from the fleet as usually happens for those with clear air and a choice of where to go. Mark and Paul, our defending champions, looked like they were destined for a 3rd straight year of being Canadian champions as they pulled away to do a near-horizon job on the last two legs while 2nd-place John and Robert likewise distanced themselves from the rest of the fleet. The only other move of note was made by Uncle Al and Nick who were among the very few to opt for the left-hand gate mark - note pic above with boats heading for the right-hand mark. As a result, they moved in clear air up the right side of the second beat and ended up finishing in 4th place, just behind Jim and Linda. Marc Bennett and Julie Seraphinoff had a great 2nd beat and moved up into 3rd place but found some holes on the final run and dropped into 5th place at the finish. Rounding out the top half-dozen were Heider Funck and Tom Wharton.


#2: winds ESE, 6 to 8 knots  This was a race that was Al's for the taking as he and Nick (above) snuck in near the port layline to the first windward mark and tacked - legally - into a narrow lead over Sue and Steph (blue hull above left) just before rounding. Busy "covering" race 1 winners and defending champs, Mark and Paul, Uncle Al let both Sue and Heider go further left on the second beat than Al did, a move which did keep him and Nick in front of the Taylors but saw SHADES round a close 2nd ahead of Heider and but behind Sue off the second beat.


Early in the final run to the finish line, lightweights, Sue and Steph showed blinding speed and had soon moved into a healthy lead that they would never relinquish. Not even when they hit a dead spot near the finish line (above). In a crucial comeback that ultimately spelled a 2009 Nationals victory for them, Heider and Tom (600 above) edged out Al and Nick (red spi) while Alastair and David Ryder-Turner (r) had made it a close four-boat race at the finish.


Rounding out the top six were Mark Taylor who edged out Marc Bennett (864) by the slimmest of margins as can been beautifully seen above in Boris' lovely finish photo.

#3: winds E, 8 to 10 knots  With winds backing into the east, those in the know realized it would likely pay to hold starboard tack off the line until near the port-tack layline to the windward mark (a wind phenomenon known at TSCC as the George Blanchard shift!). Both Heider and Al played this shift to perfection and rounded a comfortable 1-2 ahead of Sue Pilling and John Cawthorne who were in turn followed by Alastair Ryder-Turner, Marc Bennett and Mark Taylor. Not too much catching up done on the near-hull-speed run, though Al fell just short of getting a huge break at the leeward gate where Heider was about to round the right-hand mark to port until Tom screamed and Heider corrected just in time. Al rounded right on Heider's transom and followed the leader into the left corner, something he, in retrospect, might have done better to avoid since Heider and Tom slowly but surely created an insurmountable lead as Al and Nick sailed along in their "dirt".


Ultimately, Heider cruised to a very substantial victory over Al (above right) well in front of the remainder of the fleet.


By the narrowest of margins (above) Sue Pilling (blue hull) took 3rd ahead of Alastair, while John Cawthorne took a very close 5th. Marc Bennett rounded out the top six as he slipped across the line just ahead of Mark Taylor.

#4: winds E, 8 to 15 knots  With a good hiking breeze now in full swing, the first thing we got was a general recall when Marc Bennett pushed a number of barging boats across the line. In the ensuing second try at a start, the RC made sure - unintentionally, of course! - that we'd have no more recalls by cutting a minute off our sequence and giving the start signal with a minute to go. Marc, Jim and Mike among others lost big time when the RC this surprise move while they were well out of position. Meanwhile, Lady Luck was smiling on Uncle Al who noticed that only the Class Flag remained hoisted when Nick announced that we supposedly had a minute and 20 seconds left to the start signal. Fully expecting either postponement or abandonment to be signalled, Al nonetheless started started at the mis-timed gun - just to be on the safe side - as did several others.


Making initial full use of his good fortune, Al (standing in his boat in the upper photo above) rounded the windward and offset marks with a lovely lead over Mike Codd (4600), John Cawthorne (3654) and Heider Funck (600). Al and Nick held most of their lead down to the gate where Al, little realizing that this would be the final race of the 2009 Nationals, chose to round the left-hand gate mark to facilitate spi douse and stowage, and left the nearest competition (photo immediately above) to round the right-hand mark. This proved to be the series-deciding error in strategy as it left Heider clear air in which to head straight for the "George Blanchard" corner at a time when Al could/should have made Heider sail in his disturbed air as Heider had so successfully done in the previous race.

By the time Al and Nick had finished fyrkling and finally tacked towards the favoured side, Heider and Tom had eaten up virtually Al's whole lead such that they were right on his heels starting the final run. Here Heider took Al's wind and ended up keeping his bow just in front of Al's all the way to a most exciting finish - one that ended up winning the Nationals for Heider and Tom.


Placing an excellent 3rd was John Cawthorne (3654 above) who beat out Alastair (centre) and Mark (right) while Roger Shepherd and Raewyn Perry saved their best for last as they nailed a fine 6th just behind the three boats above.