Story and photos by Art Petrosemolo
The weatherman said light and variable winds for the Monmouth Boat Club’s Flying Scot Full Moon Regatta Saturday, June 7, and he was right.
Seventeen skippers and crew floated around the Navesink River off of Red Bank for two hours in the morning and more than an hour in the afternoon before a little of the sea breeze reached the racecourse.
Principal Race Officer Dale Barney quickly set a short, twice-around, windward-leeward course, and got two races completed before sending the sunburn, exhausted sailors back to the dock.
Past Commodore Denis Farley, Monmouth Beach, who has competed and won in most of MBC’s current and past one-design class, sailing with Pris Gettis, West Long Branch, took the start but lost the lead at the first windward mark in the first race and finished second to past Full Moon winners John and Toni Luard, Locust. Farley put together a convincing win in race 2 to win the championship.
With the fickle winds changing direction a few degrees every few minutes, Farley – in the final race – waited patiently, bow to wind, outside the pin on the starting line during the 5-minute prerace countdown. He maneuvered his Scot inside the mark as the gun sounded and sailed away from the fleet on a port tack in clear air.
Chased by 15 boats three windward and two downwind legs, Farley covered his closest challengers and led from gun to finish for his first Full Moon title.
The Luards, who finished second with 6 points, crossed the line fifth in the second race and praised Farley and Gettis, at the awards ceremony, for reading the wind shifts and sailing a perfect race 2. Bernard and Andre Friel, Rumson, were third with 11 points (an eighth and a third) beating Cole Barney, Red Bank, and crew in a tiebreaker.
In the challenger class, Bob Markoff of Tinton Falls, sailing with Keith Petrosemolo of Shrewsbury, as crew, defeated Lee Davidson of Fair Haven, sailing with Jackie Cattanach, for the title.
