What a whirlwind week that was!?!  The “Carnie Invasion”, the shows at the Surf, the Boat Parade, the official 4th of July Parade down Main Ave and of course the fireworks! Beating  Clear Lake on the 4th of July is near impossible!!! It’s always great fun, but in some cases a relief to have the madness over!

It looks as though the wind may be a bit more cooperative this Friday, so Jeff Nicholas would like to invite all those interested folks back to his dock to test out the new Melges 15’s.  That’s Friday, July 8th at 1pm for the youth sailors and 4pm for the adults.  Fingers crossed the weather cooperates better than last week!

The Russ Schurtz Memorial Dad/Mom/Lad/Lass Regatta which traditionally is sailed on Father’s Day, is on its second date for 2022 due to various circumstances. This Sunday at 2pm, the great CLYC summer tradition continues. Tune your radios to Channel 72 an hour ahead of time to hear the intentions of PRO Tommy Erickson… The parents get to show off their skills on the race course with the kids crewing… It’s more about fun, the kids ridiculing their parents choices in the boat and the club enjoying the spectacle than it is about the outcome and bragging rights, but those are up for grabs!  So come one, come all, Sunday afternoon to the lake and watch as they do battle for bragging rights as the best X boat parent/child duo on the water.

This weekend brings two ILYA regattas; the ILYA E Invitational at Pewaukee Yacht Club which the Oltrogge/Haugerud and Price teams will be attending and the ILYA MC Invitational at White Bear Yacht Club which Mark Tesar will be attending.  Both events should be around 40 boats; the E Invitational has ten, yes 10, youth skippers registered!  Now that’s a feat!  Leif Lundberg heads back to Wisconsin, this time to the GLSS Dinghyfest at Lake Geneva; this is always a big regatta and a great warmup for the upcoming ILYA X Champs here in Clear Lake.  Safe travels and best of luck to all those folks!

Speaking of the X Champs… You undoubtedly know we’re hosting the X and Opti Championships here in Clear Lake from July 27th through August 2nd… The volunteer board is stacked with tons of folks; more of course are still needed.  We need spectator boats and drivers, we have various spots on land that need to be filled and lastly we have a spot or two on the RC needed for the Opti Championships.  If you can lend any assistance at all please contact one of the following:  Julie Oltrogge (various) clyciowa@gmail.com, Mike Starbeck (spectator boats) michael.starbeck@gmail.com, Mark Tesar (RC) mtesar@cltel.net

The Fourth of July Regatta was sailed last weekend, it was also the final weekend of the First Series.  Wait a minute, doesn’t that mean our season is half over?  Grrrrr! The racing through the entire First Series was tough and close, the winds in some cases were mind numbing while the waves were reminiscent of the agitator cycle of your washing machine! Despite the conditions a good number of race boats AND a lot of spectator boats were out on the water to enjoy each other, the racing and our greatest love, the lake!  Side note – whoever was flying the drone last weekend is a heckuva pilot, that thing had to be within 10 feet of us, yet never in danger of hitting or disturbing anyone!  Well done Maverick!

First Series Recap: Have you looked at the scores in the X boat fleet this year?  Competitive is an understatement. These kids come out every weekend and give it everything they have; they participate in clinics and off lake regattas; a marked improvement in skill and confidence is evident as we watch them on the weekends! One point on the average is all that separated first from fourth.  Five different boats have race wins and the proximity of finishes from first to last has become much closer!  The last three X Fleet Champions are still racing in the fleet and several other teams are making their presence known in 2022.  Leif Lundberg (2020 Fleet Champion), using the skills he’s learned traveling, narrowly won the first series over Jude Sorensen, Elle Ebeling (2021 Fleet Champion), Sam Ludwig (2019 Fleet Champion) and Finley Nyhus.  Great work by all the sailors in the fleet! The entire membership is incredibly proud of you all!

The first series in the MC fleet was a two horse race; the “Brothers Tesar”, Todd and Mark fought down to the very last race to determine the winner! Last Sunday’s race was tricky and didn’t start well for Mark as he was called OCS.  He fought back and finished 5th, with younger brother Todd finishing 6th; that gave Mark the one point advantage and the series win!  Eric Protzman sailed a great first series taking third place, Stu Oltrogge in 4th just .05 points behind Eric then Dan Allen finished 5th.

Team Loon, Z-23…Emily Haugerud, husband Dave and father Stu Oltrogge showed everyone in the E fleet how it’s done! It must be the new boat…It certainly can’t be the extra practice sessions or tuning time they put in…They won every race they sailed but one and led a race which was eventually abandoned by a mile!  Very impressive sailing! Mark Tesar takes a bullet and a host of 2nds finishing 2nd with Dan Allen and Eric Protzman close behind in 3rd and 4th respectively.

First Series Results: 

Fourth of July Regatta Recap: The light/medium breeze with holiday chop seemed to fit Finley Nyhus and crew Grayson Harris very well! They sailed beautifully winning both Saturday races and ultimately the regatta; second place was Jude Sorensen with Leif Lundberg in third after winning a tiebreaker over Elle Ebeling, Sam Ludwig finished in 5th. The best part of the racing…Every X boat was on the race course!

It’s not shocking the 4th of July Regatta came down to the very last race in the MC Fleet, with five boats in contention to win. The conditions put a premium on patience and consistency. The fleet had three different race winners and each race saw a very compressed fleet from start to finish. Mark Tesar’s previously mentioned 5th place finish in the final race was good enough to tie Dan Allen for the 4th of July Regatta and ultimately win the regatta on a tie breaker!   Todd Tesar wound up 3rd with Eric Protzman and Stu Oltrogge rounding out the top 5.  Close racing at its finest here in Clear Lake!

What can we say about the Saturday afternoon racing for the E and C fleets… Let’s see…Oh, I know… The C boats made it to the starting line and about three-quarters of the way up the first beat!  That’s almost as much club racing as they did all of 2021!!!  Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on where you were at on the race course, the wind shut off and the races were abandoned…Thanks to Tommy and Denni Sue for setting the best course they could and at least giving us a shot at some racing!  Since no races were completed, the 4th of July Regatta will be sailed for in the E and C fleets this weekend.

4th of July Regatta Results:

Now that the carnival has left and hopefully most of the mess is cleaned up, the Sailing Center is back in business.  4 more sessions are scheduled after this week; that means you have plenty of time to get the kids, grandkids, nephews and nieces all registered for lessons!   www.clycss.com They have a great group of instructors and a Board doing some amazing things; take advantage of their vision now!

Early notice for the Yacht Club party we’ve all been waiting for!  That’s right Saturday, July 16th starting at 6:30 pm at Jeff Brakke’s residence, 1929 N Shore Dr.  Food, full bar, and entertainment. More details will come next week; I can promise you, this is an event you won’t want to miss!

Next week, I’ll update you all with regatta results from our sailors who traveled and provide more details on the next party!  Until then friends…

Stay in Clear Air,

Dan Allen
MC 2811 – Relentless
E Scow Z-11 – Wild Side
dsallen@cltel.net
www.clyciowa.com
www.clycss.com