|
The Morning Light team sails past Waikiki
to start the first of two overnight voyages
around Molokai Island
|
|
Morning
Light PRESS RELEASE
|
|
Feb.
15, 2007
|
A good night for
Morning Light
HONOLULU---The fledgling Morning Light team needed to get a
taste of what the Transpacific Yacht Race would be like this
summer, and they got it with their first of two 138-nautical mile
trips around the island of Molokai and back.
Starting at 6:08 p.m. HST at dusk off Diamond Head on Oahu
Tuesday and finishing at 10:45 a.m. Wednesday, for the most
part it was hard work in the dark with little time to rest, but the
15 young men and women might have had the times of their
lives in the 16 ½ hours they spent sailing their Transpac 52.
Jeremy Wilmot, 21, a watch captain and the lone Australian
member of the team, said, "It was great, 20 knots downwind
with gusts to 25, jibing down the Molokai [Channel], some really
good sail changes---it was fun!"
Sailing manager Robbie Haines said, "Almost everybody
steered at some time. Jeremy was at the helm when we first put
the kite up, and he was terrific. All of these kids were
spectacular."
Haines, navigation coach Stan Honey and instructor Dave Tank
were on board, "but we were all down below most of the time, on
purpose," Haines said. "We wanted the kids to do it all
themselves. They'd ask questions, but they made all the calls
about sail changes, when to jibe and when to tack, and they
were right on in their decisions. I couldn't be happier."
Wilmot comes from a long line of Australian offshore racers but
hadn't had much experience sailing a high- performance boat in
big breeze on a moonless night, especially through the
notorious Molokai Channel between Molokai and Oahu that has
crushed many Transpac hopes.
"We did four jibes in the Molokai," Wilmot said, smiling.
"Steering at night, you find out if you have a feel for the boat.
Everybody was awesome."
Chris Branning, 21, the navigator for this initial offshore outing,
said, "[Wilmot] is a major asset to this team."
Honey, who charted ABN AMRO's victorious course in the 2005-
06 Volvo Ocean Race, mostly left the navigation up to Branning,
a junior at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. Branning, holed
up at the nav station below decks, worked from GPS to guide
Morning Star on a tacking route along Molokai's lee south shore
before turning the east end of the island and heading back.
"I'd come up once in awhile to help on sail changes," Branning
said. "Working with those guys out on the bow was a lot of fun."
Mark Towill, 18, the Hawaiian member of the team, said, "It was
pretty normal conditions. People cycled through a lot of
positions on the boat, and all the changes went well."
The only break in the action came at 8 a.m. Wednesday when
the wind dropped to 5 knots near Koko Head at the
southeastern approach to Oahu. The crew dropped the jib and
motored for a while before enough wind returned to allow them to
pass Diamond Head under spinnaker.
Otherwise, Charlie Enright, 22, of Brown University, said,
"Nobody got more than two hours sleep."
And the food?
"We had freeze-dried beef stroganoff . . . for breakfast," Genny
Tulloch, 22, of Houston, said. "But it was neat, especially
trimming the kite and surfing the waves. It's cool to know when
you're in the groove."
For Graham Brant-Zawadzki, 22, of Newport Beach, who has
been sailing for only two years, it was the first time to sail at
night.
"The stars are incredible," he said, "and then we were sitting on
deck this morning [saying], 'Where's the sun?' "
Soon, there it was, the morning light.
This second of four monthly training sessions will wind up
Tuesday at the end of another run around Molokai, with no
instructors on board. Meanwhile, the team will do its first race
as part of the host Waikiki Yacht Club's Opening Day
ceremonies Saturday and its second with the Hawaii YC's
Opening Day on Sunday.
The twin goals of the Morning Light project are to prepare and
send a youthful team from diverse backgrounds in a major
ocean race and to produce a documentary film of the entire
experience. The film is being produced by Roy E. Disney and
Leslie DeMeuse of Pacific High Productions in association with
Disney Studios and is scheduled for theater release early next
year.
More information:
www.pacifichighproductions.com
www.transpacificyc.org
MEDIA CONTACTS
Rich Roberts
(310) 835-2526
cell (310) 766-6547
Michiko Wada
(808) 554-3328
|
|
As cameras record every
move, Kate Theisen (l.)
backs the TP52 into its slip
after sailing around Molokai
Morning Light crew heads for
Molokai at sunset
In earlier training, Steve
Manson starts the MOB drill
With Diamond Head behind,
Piet Van Os drives as
Jesse Fielding trims
|
|
|
The Morning Light team
(Ages at time of race)
CHRIS BRANNING, 21,
Sarasota, Fla.,
junior, U.S. Merchant Marine Academy.
GRAHAM BRANT-ZAWADZKI, 22,
Newport Beach, Calif., senior, Stanford
Univ.
CHRIS CLARK, 21, Old Greenwich,
Conn., sailmaker, junior at Univ. of Mary
Washington.
CHARLIE ENRIGHT, 22, Providence, R.I.,
racing coach, senior, Brown Univ.
JESSE FIELDING, 20, North Kingstown,
R.I., boat worker, sailing teacher,
student Univ. of Rhode Island.
ROBBIE KANE, 22, Fairfield, Conn.,
racing sailboat captain.
STEVE MANSON, 22, Baltimore, Md.,
sailing instructor.
CHRIS SCHUBERT, 22, Rye, N.Y.,
Midshipman First Class, U.S. Naval
Academy.
KATE THEISEN, 20, Socorro, N.M.,
planetary scientist student, New Mexico
Tech.
MARK TOWILL, 18, Kaneohe, Hawaii,
senior, Punahou High School.
GENNY TULLOCH, 22, Houston, Texas,
sailor.
PIET VAN OS, 23, La Jolla, Calif., senior,
California Maritime Academy.
CHRIS WELCH, 19, Grosse Pointe Park,
Mich., boat prep and deliveries, soph.,
Michigan State Univ.
KIT WILL, 22, Milton, Mass., senior,
Connecticut College.
JEREMY WILMOT, 21, Sydney,
Australia, sophomore, St. Mary's College
of Maryland.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
TRANSPAC RACE STATUS
