Groovederci on fire

Deneen Demourkas takes M30 North American Championship in build-up to the Worlds

After seven tight races in Rhode Island Sound and Narragansett Bay, Deneen Demourkas’ Groovederci (above) showed superb speed and consistency in capturing the crown of M 30 North American Champion for 2008. The team from Santa Barbara, CA posted a score line of 1,1,2,2 on the first day and after all racing was postponed on day 2, they held a three point lead over Bodo & Nick von der Wense’s Turbo Duck heading into the final day of racing. John Podmajersy’s Illusion was just one point behind Turbo Duck as the sailors rigged their boats on Sunday morning in little to no breeze yet again.

PRO Peter “Luigi” Reggio decided to move the racecourse out of Rhode Island Sound and set up inside Narragansett Bay just North of Gould Island for Sunday’s racing. The day started out looking pretty bleak as the boats all were left adrift for a few hours after arriving at the racing area. Shortly after noon, however, a nice southerly breeze began to funnel up the bay and as soon as it started Luigi and the RC team from the Storm Trysail Club were in place and ready to go.

In the first race of the day, tactician Mark Ivey aboard Illusion spotted something out to the right side and set up the boat to weather of the fleet and tacked out immediately off the starting line. Jeff Maludy’s Adrenalin followed Illusion out to the right and the two boats got a great shift out of Cranston Cove and led the fleet to the first mark. While Illusion was able to hold off the fleet to take the gun, Turbo Duck and Groovederci were able to use their speed to grind through the fleet, battling each other along the way. After rounding the gate together and staying close through the race, Turbo Duck was in a position just to weather and covering Demourkas as the two boats approached the finish in second and third. With the wind getting sucked out of Groovederci’s kite, they luffed up and forced the von der Wenses to head up hard, almost losing control. The smooth move allowed Groovederci to sail cleanly to the finish and capture second in the race.

After watching what worked in the previous race, the majority of the fleet tacked off the line following the start of race 6 looking for the puff out of the cove on the right side. This time it was Turbo Duck and Moise Solomon’s Kaizen that split from the fleet and the two boats found more pressure on the left side to lead at the first mark. As Turbo Duck held on to the lead, Groovederci used its speed again to work through the fleet. Demourkas was sailing upwind with the leech of the mainsail slightly more open than the rest of the fleet and the crew hiking just a little harder. The result was that Groovederci was sailing flatter than the competition and the other boats were falling down into them in the puffs. On the run to the finish, Kaizen waited too long before gybing to the finish, allowing Groovederci to claim another second place finish.

After a quick reset of the course, Luigi announced that the seventh race would be the last of the series and course 3, with an upwind finish was posted. With victory all but insured, the Groovederci team went out in style, with tactician Scott Nixon calling a great race to go along with Demourkas’ superb driving as they sailed to the victory in the race and the series. A little further back, Illusion needed to put a boat between themselves and Turbo Duck to move into second overall and they got the help they needed from Kaizen.

In the end, Groovederci took the victory and the Irish Cup with an impressive final score of 11 points after seven races. Illusion won a tiebreaker with Turbo Duck to finish second and Kaizen took fourth in a tiebreaker with Adrenalin after a strong final day performance. At the end of the day, all the competitors agreed that the Race Committee did a fantastic job in less than optimal conditions and the racing was just a blast. Special thanks to SLAM, Hall Spars and Harken for their support of the 2008 M 30 North American Championship. The M 30 fleet will next be competing in the World Championship on October 1-4, also in Newport.