Liz Baylis

We’re on the plane headed back to the mainland, leaving the blue water and white beaches behind (and planning the return trip!).

Today we finished up the regatta with the semi-finals and finals for both the Open and Women’s Divisions.  The pairings were:

Open: Taylor Canfield vs. Chris Haycroft and William Bailey vs. Alex Anderson.
Women: Genny Tulloch vs. Lee Icyda and Anna Tunnicliffe vs. SFWMRT

In the Open division, Canfield won his semi 2-0, Bailey won his 2-1.  And Canfield went on to win the Finals 3-1.

Women’s Division semis:  We won our semi with two wins against  Anna Tunnicliffe, but of course, it wasn’t as simple as that!  We had two great matches with lead changes and good match racing and excitement.  The course area was very close to the bulkhead in downtown Charlotte Amalie where they had set up a viewing pavilion complete with announcer.  At times the spectators probably could have touched boats tacking off the wall.  They really enjoyed our close races. (And where else can you race where you have to say “I have to tack now because the seaplane is landing”?) It was some fun sailing and not just because we won both matches.  Genny Tulloch won two against Lee Icyda, so we met Genny and team in the finals.

The finals were not quite as much fun for us as we found ourselves behind with no passing opportunities. It was lighter and the “helicopter puffs” didn’t seem to be spinning our way. We lost the final 3-0 which was a bit of a down way to finish the regatta.  Genny and her crew (Sally Barkow, Jen Glass, and Liz Hall) sailed a really good regatta – congratulations to them!

We had a great time and felt we sailed pretty well, but not quite well enough!  So, we have some more work to do, so we can come down here next year and stand atop the podium.

The event was fantastic – the organization, the venue, the hospitality, the weather were all incredible!  A big thank you to our hosts – Lawrence, Lisa, and Maia Aqui who put us up in their lovely home. It was great to feel at home in a new place.

The event was hosted by the St. Thomas Yacht Club and their web site is http://www.styc.net/index.php  There may be some photos posted there.

Thanks again to all of you for supporting our match racing, it’s been a great year and we could not have done it without your support!

Cheers,
Liz, Pease, Cory, and Jo Ann
The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team

In case anyone didn’t catch it yesterday - the Virgin Islands are AWESOME!!!

We started right off this morning with the women’s second round robin.  And it appears the San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team likes sailing in the morning!  We started off with two wins against Icyda and Tunnicliffe.  Followed that with an unfortunate loss to Hayes. But came right back with wins against Bienvenu and Tulloch.  The wins didn’t come without a bit of excitement!  Many of the matches had lots of lead changes and good close match racing.  (And one of the matches involved a little collision which was unfortunate, but our competitor was found at fault.)  So, it was a better day for us and we will be moving on to the semi-finals tomorrow.  The winner of the round robins, Genny Tulloch, will get to choose her competitor in the morning.

Scores after the round robins:
Tulloch: 8-2 (*won tie break)
Tunnicliffe: 8-2
SFWMRT: 6-4
Icyda: 4-6 (*won tie break)
Hayes: 4-6
Bienvenu: 0-10 (-1 point for damage)

Tomorrow the open and women’s semi-finals and finals will be sailed together – skipper’s briefing at 0745 and first start at 0900.  Racing will be done by 1300.

The event is being hosted by the St. Thomas Yacht Club and their web site is http://www.styc.net/index.php  Hopefully, there will be information posted there during the week.

The weather link: http://www.wunderground.com/US/VI/Saint_Thomas.html

Again a reminder that we will be posting these (and future) reports on Liz’s web site as well: http://lizbaylis.com/

Thanks for the support!  Keep the good cheer rolling our way!

Hopefully we’ll have more good news after racing tomorrow!

Cheers,
Liz, Pease, Cory, and Jo Ann
The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team

In case anyone was wondering, the Virgin Islands are AWESOME!!!

Yesterday we had what was meant to be a quiet 2 hour practice session in the morning followed by a relaxing afternoon exploring some of the finer beaches on St. Thomas. Well… Best laid plans… We left the dock at 10 and sailed down to the course area off “downtown” and set a leeward mark then sailed toward the seawall on starboard and tacked on to port and “BANG” the port chainplate blows out and we tack immediately onto starboard but not before the mast had buckled just above the boom.  It didn’t come down, but it was broken.  We sailed a few feet over to the seawall and tied up and called the yacht club.  Rough start of the regatta. They gave us another boat and off we went for the next session – which was pleasantly uneventful.

Today, the men’s event (which is running parallel with ours with eight teams) had their first round robin in the morning.  We sat on the seawall and watched.  It was great – the racing comes right up to the seawall downtown and is great for spectating. The boys were done at about one and it was the girls’ turn.  With six teams (Anna Tunnicliffe, Genny Tulloch, SFWMRT, Sandy Hayes,Louise Bienvenu, and Lee Icyda)  our round robin would take 5 flights.  It was really shifty and puffy and the runs turned into beats and immediately back into runs with sea planes landing in the pre-start area.  Does this paint a good picture?

A highlight of our day was our starts – we won all of them and lead at 90% of the first windward marks.  That’s where some of difficulties began!  We had a little trouble with the “get ahead and stay ahead” philosophy today. We had a couple of boathandling issues and a couple of unfortunate shifts, but overall we felt that we sailed better than our scorecard of 2-3 shows for the day.

Tomorrow is another round robin in the morning – skipper’s briefing at 0745 and first start at 0900.  A new start to the day!

Scores after the first round robin (from memory):
Tunnicliffe: 5-0
Tulloch: 4-1
Icyda: 2-3
SFWMRT: 2-3
Hayes: 2-3
Bienvenu: 0-5

The event is being hosted by the St. Thomas Yacht Club and their web site is http://www.styc.net/index.php  Hopefully, there will be information posted there during the week.

The weather link: http://www.wunderground.com/US/VI/Saint_Thomas.html

Again a reminder that we will be posting these (and future) reports on Liz’s web site as well: http://lizbaylis.com/

Thanks for the support!  Keep the good cheer rolling our way!

More news tomorrow!

Cheers,
Liz, Pease, Cory, and Jo Ann
The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team

Hi,

The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team (SFWMRT) heads to St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, for the inaugural Carlos Aguilar Memorial Match Race Regatta tomorrow.  This will be the last event in our 2008 season so we are looking to have some fun and end the year on a high note with a win!  The team for this event brings together a mix of great sailors who have been a part of the SFWMRT over the years: Liz will take her normal position in the back of the boat; Pease Glaser calling tactics and trimming the main; Cory Sertl trimming the jib and spinnaker; and Jo Ann Fisher running around on the bow.

We will be sailing a boat that is somewhat unique to the Virgin Islands: An IC 24 – this is a J/24 hull and rig that has had the deck removed and replaced with a more “user-friendly” deck layout like the Melges 24.  We’ll try to post some photos or get some links so you can see what they are like.

The event is being hosted by the St. Thomas Yacht Club and their web site is http://www.styc.net/index.php  Hopefully, there will be information posted there during the week.

The weather link: http://www.wunderground.com/US/VI/Saint_Thomas.html

In case we again have trouble with our mailing list (hopefully the gremlins are gone), we will be posting our reports on Liz’s web site as well: http://lizbaylis.com/

More soon!

Cheers,
Liz, Pease, Cory, and Jo Ann
The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team

Yesterday the top four sailed the semi-finals and we sailed against Sato for 5th.

In the first semi-final, Sally Barkow (USA) beat Susanne Ward (DEN) 3-0.  And in the second semi-final, Claire Leroy (FRA) beat Katie Spithill (AUS) 3-0, thus setting up the Franco-American finals of Barkow vs. Leroy.  The petit-finals will see Spithill vs. Ward.

In the lower places, we beat Sato (JPN) 3-0 to claim 5th and Tylinska (POL) beat Boyd (AUS) to take 7th.

Lower placings:
5th: Baylis (USA)
6th: Sato (JPN)
7th: Tylinska (POL)
8th: Boyd (AUS)
9th: Naik (IND)
10th: Li xue (CHN)
11th: Lim (KOR)

Our fifth place did earn us enough prize money to help defray most of our travel costs (even after the 27.5% !!! tax the Korean government is taking off the top), so that made our final finish position a little less disappointing.

For the finals today, Liz will be doing the live English commentary on the beach for the festival.  It’s a pretty big deal here which is really cool.

The event web site is http://www.bsaf.or.kr/event_eng/event_01.htm has a lot of photos posted now.  We have a bunch of photos as well and will try to post some soon on www.lizbaylis.com or on one of our Facebook pages.

Cheers,
Liz, Molly, Shala, Karen, and Sam
The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team

After some exciting racing off Haeundae Beach, the finals are set for the 2008 Busan Women’s World Match.

In the first semi-final, Sally Barkow (USA) beat Susanne Ward (DEN) 3-0.  And in the second semi-final, Claire Leroy (FRA) beat Katie Spithill (AUS) 3-0, thus setting up the Franco-American finals of Barkow vs. Leroy.  The petit-finals will see Spithill vs. Ward.

In the lower places, Baylis (USA) beat Sato (JPN) 3-0 to claim 5th and Tylinska (POL) beat Boyd (AUS) to take 7th.

Lower placings:
5th: Baylis (USA)
6th: Sato (JPN)
7th: Tylinska (POL)
8th: Boyd (AUS)
9th: Naik (IND)
10th: Li xue (CHN)
11th: Lim (KOR)

For more information, results, and photos, visit the event website: http://www.bsaf.or.kr/event_eng/event_01.htm

We went out yesterday knowing we had our work cut out for us as Barkow, Leroy, Spithill and Ward were all sailing well and only four of us would make it into the semi-finals.  After a long delay waiting for wind, our first match was against Ward.  We were overlapped going around the leeward mark and for the first time in the regatta our crew work let us down and we had an awful rounding and never had a chance to recover. We then had a LONG wait on the beach while others raced, then went out on the water for our last two matches. Our penultimate match was against the Japanese and we lead all the way around and they had a very problematic leeward mark rounding and could not get their spinnaker down, so we did not need to fly a spinnaker on the second run to win by well over a leg.  This set up our match with Claire Leroy.  We started even but to leeward and got out to the port layline and followed her in to the mark. We gained on both downwind legs, but never enough to really attack her, so we lost that one.

The results after the complete Round Robin:
Barkow 9-1
Leroy 9-1
Ward 8-2
Spithill 8-2
Baylis 6-4
Sato 3.5-6 (.5 off for damage)
Boyd 3-7
Tylinska 3-7
Li xue 2-8
Naik 2-8
Lim 1-9

Today (Saturday here, Friday at home) the top four will sail the semi-finals and we will sail against Sato for 5th.

The internet connection here is a bit sketchy and we’ve been having a little trouble with the mailing list, so if you aren’t getting the updates, please check on our web site: http://www.lizbaylis.com.

We’ll try to keep you updated the best we can over the next few days, but if you are looking for information the event web site is http://www.bsaf.or.kr/event_eng/event_01.htm seems to be updated regularly.

Last night we attended a performance of “Jump”, a world renowned “Korean Martial Arts Comedy”.  It was great.  If you want to read about it: http://www.playbill.com/news/article/111694.html
Cheers,
Liz, Molly, Shala, Karen, and Sam
The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team

Another interesting day on the water.  We sailed the first flight out away from the beach in the middle of the channel where there was steadier breeze, but a bit of current. Our match was against Sam Boyd from Australia and our crew work was great which allowed us to take advantage of our opponent’s poor leeward mark rounding and extend for the win.  We then had thee flights off and the racing moved back tot he beach side venue.  By the time we went back out for our race against Sally Barkow the breeze was very spotty and we found a good hole while Sally escaped around the first mark and that was it.  Our next two matches were against the Polish team, Tylinska, and the Korean team, Lim, and we were able to control the starts and extend for two more wins.

The results after 13 of 19 flights:
Leroy 6-0
Spithill 4-2
Baylis 5-2
Barkow 7-1
Ward 6-1
Boyd 3-4
Tylinska 2-6
Sato 3-4
Li xue 1-6
Lim 0-7
Naik 1-6

Tomorrow we think we will continue the round robin. The conditions have been tough on the Organizers to say the least!

The internet connection here is a bit sketchy and we’ve been having a little trouble with the mailing list, so if you aren’t getting the updates, please check on our web site: http://www.lizbaylis.com.

We’ll try to keep you updated the best we can over the next few days, but if you are looking for information the event web site is http://www.bsaf.or.kr/event_eng/event_01.htm seems to be updated regularly.

Cheers,
Liz, Molly, Shala, Karen, and Sam
The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team

Yesterday was the practice day and we got to experience the new boats for the first time. Everyone seemed to have fun trying to figure out the boats and the 50 degree wind shifts sailing along the beach in the lee of a big hill.

Today we started the round robin. Since there are six boats and eleven teams, everybody only sails half the time. Most of the teams have sailed three matches so far. We sat out the first three flights then raced three flights before it started to get dark. Our first match was a little more exciting than it should have been as we had a little contact with the Indian team, Naik, at the start and got penalized. We cleared our penalty then got a penalty on Naik and won the match. Our next match was against Katie Spithill and we lost the start then got close, but never quite close enough. And we ended the day against the Chinese team, Li xue. They received an early entry penalty and we were able to extend and win the match.

The results after 6 of 19 flights:

Leroy 3-0

Spithill 2-1

Baylis 2-1

Barkow 3-0

Ward 2-1

Boyd 1-2

Tylinska 2-1

Sato 1-2

Li xue 1-3

Lim 0-5

Naik 1-2

Tomorrow we will continue the round robin.

The internet connection here is a bit sketchy and we’ve been having a little trouble with the mailing list, so if you aren’t getting the updates, please check on our web site: http://www.lizbaylis.com.

We’ll try to keep you updated the best we can over the next few days, but if you are looking for information the event web site is http://www.bsaf.or.kr/event_eng/event_01.htm seems to be updated regularly.

Cheers,

Liz, Molly, Shala, Karen, and Sam

The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team

The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team is gathering in Busan, Korea, for our penultimate event of the 2008 season – The Busan Women’s World Match Race.  This event will be a truly international event with nine countries represented including for the first time ever – 4 Asian countries – Korea, China, Japan, and India. There will also be four teams ranked in the top ten in the World:

Claire Leroy (FRA) - ISAF #1
Liz Baylis (USA) - ISAF #4
Katie Spithill (AUS) - ISAF #5
Sally Barkow (USA) - ISAF #10
Susanne Ward (DEN) - ISAF #44
Samantha Boyd (AUS) - ISAF #45
Katarzyna Tylinska (POL) - unranked
Li Xue (CHN) - unranked
Maiko Sato (JPN) - unranked
Pallavi Naik (IND) - unranked
Lim Hwa eun (KOR) -  unranked

The SFWMRT for this event is: Liz (driving), Molly Carapiet (tactics/main trim), Karen Loutzenheiser (trim), Samantha Osborne (trim), and Shala Lawrence (bow).  We will be sailing brand new boats – K 30s (or Bakewell White 9 meters) which are 30 footers with asymmetrical kites.

When we mentioned earlier that the boats are new, we really mean brand new – they have not been launched yet – we attended the christening ceremony Friday at Busan City Hall and they are frantically getting them put together.  Hopefully they will be ready for practice tomorrow!

Shala, Molly and Liz went for a big 4 hour hike in the mountains above Busan near a fortress with a number of beautiful temples.  Sam and Karen arrive later tonight.

We’ll try to keep you updated the best we can over the next few days, but I you are looking for information the event web site is http://www.bsaf.or.kr/event_eng/event_01.htm and hopefully it will be updated regularly.

Cheers,
Liz, Molly, Shala, Karen, and Sam
The San Francisco Women’s Match Racing Team