Cold Spring Harbor Beach Club contrived to host a one-day Janeway Series despite Covid-19 restrictions on housing, communal dining, and generally hanging out. Saturday, September 19 dawned with a beautiful clear day, with NE winds gusting from 15 up to 25 knots and more. The CSHBC and Cedar Point Yacht Club fleets met off the Norwalk Islands – about 15 miles from CSH and maybe 12 miles from Westport. With NE winds and a westbound flood tide, the Cold Spring Harbor fleet had a serious uphill climb to get there. Luckily, the CSHBC Race Committee boat, Captain Bonnell, is a powerful workhorse, and was able to tow three Atlantics through the chop to get there on time. It was a rough, wet ride, and the CSH crews arrived somewhat shaken and already tired of pumping, but excited to have made it.
PRO Gary Knapp with Ken Commons and Mike Kolodner on RC support did a magnificent job of efficiently firing off three races in about three hours. Five boats sailed out from CPYC. Defending Janeway champion Eli Hazan unfortunately suffered an equipment failure before the first start, but the rest of the fleet bashed their way up toward Sheffield Island and twice around a short windward-leeward course – the first race finished in 25 minutes! Rodrigo Meireles in A129 Xangô took the honors in that race, but Lindsay Doyle (in the orange hat), skippering A141 Ghost with her dad Jim and Julia Knowlton crewing, aced the next two races and won the series. By the third race, the conditions had moderated and the winds were fluky, flaky and sometimes not as powerful as the chop and the current – but it was still good, close racing.
Cold Spring Harbor sailors had a nice downwind sail back, and a number of support craft came out from CPYC to escort their fleet home. It was a pretty wonderful day of sailing all around.