SantanaRama '08 Final
It’s in the can! Santanarama ’08, the 30th anniversary of Santana 20 Class racing is in the books. 39 boats participated in one of the best run and most fun events the class has ever seen.
Only one race was scheduled today so while it was unlikely that there would be any surprises given the points spread anything was possible on this lake.
After an hour long postponement the R/C decided to take advantage of the building West wind and sent the fleet out for the final race. Going into this final race Jim Martinez’s team on ‘Loose Nuts’ held a two point lead over Eric Kownacki’s team on ‘Alexa’. It was apparent that the Alexa team were going to attack Loose Nuts and do a little match racing in an attempt to put a boat between them. Leading up to the start Alexa had Nuts pinned (did I really say that?!) above the committee boat but peeled off too early and got pinned under a couple of boats and Nuts managed to get in cleanly above them in the controlling position.
I was a little busy dealing with a less than stellar start so couldn’t tell what was going on with the points leaders but at the top mark we were in about 6th rounding with Nuts and Alexa a couple of boats ahead of us. The leader was Nick Genovese, an up and coming junior from Eugene, who was enjoying the breeze and sailing well.
On the run the fleet split as they positioned for the leeward gates. We opted for the right gate and jumped the left gate crowd working the left side on the beat. At the second weather mark we were in a solid third behind Genovese and Jason Crowson on ‘Sea Bear’. Jason was in a dogfight with Gordon Matattal for 5th and Gordon was in fourth at the mark.
On the run we pulled away from Gordon and Jason managed to pass Genovese at the leeward mark. We passed Genovese on the beat and took second behind Jason, who sailed a perfect race. We knew we hadn’t lost our 4th place position but had to wait and watch the boats approaching the finish to see if we had put the required number of boats between us and Paul Stephens to nip into third.When the dust settled Eric Kownacki with crew Bob Martin and Tom Jenkins did what they had to do and won the 2008 class championship by six points over Jim Martinez, Chris Murschel and Rob (don’t know Rob’s last name). Eric has been sailing S-20’s for four years and he and his team put together a very solid effort and thoroughly deserved their win. The Loose Nuts team sailed a great regatta in the challenging conditions and were tough to the end. The top ten were as follows:
- Eric Kownacki 44 points
- Jim Martinez 50
- Chris Winnard 59
- Paul Stephens 61
- Jason Crowson 66
- Gordon Mattatal 68
- Bruce Golison 74
- Robin Avery 84
- Mark Edrich 89
- Britt Williams 94
It should be noted that every race was won by a different boat. No one dominated, and the above scores over seven races show how tough this event was.
Santana 20 Fleet 19 did a fantastic job putting this regatta on and if there ever was a candidate for the St. Petersburg Trophy this would be it in my opinion.Next year’s Class Championship will be hosted by Mission Bay Yacht Club in San Diego. They have a hard act to follow but a Mission Bay is great venue so it should be another fantastic gathering of Tunas. Official results and notices can be found at www.s20.org.
What a great race to end on. Good wind, challenging competition and multiple plot lines. If Jason (Sea Bear) sailed "a perfect race", then ours was close... Just not close enough to move up. We had a pretty good start and first beat and managed to round the first mark in the top ten. For the next three legs we passed a couple boats. On the last leg we chose the north gate and the right side of the course. This helped us pass Nick and gain on DA and Sea Bear. We crossed the line for a satisfying third. A great week.
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