Western Carolina Sailing Club, in Anderson South Carolina, held our 17th Annual Hospice Regatta this past weekend. The event raises funds for a local non-profit Hospice Organization called Hospice of the Upstate. The Regatta is part of the National Hospice Regatta Alliance where events are held all over the country to benefit a local Hospice charity.

This year we had record numbers of Flying Scot's (18) and boats in total (96). We also exceeded our goal ($75,000) and raised $80,600. We take a lot of pride in throwing a great party with fantastic food, lot's of cold beer and most importantly, great race management. We have 3 courses setup, a distance course, a Keelboat course and a dinghy course. We try really hard to make sure we have competent and quality race PRO's and race committee.

With 18 boats on the race course on Saturday at noon, we had pretty much a zero breeze day shaping up. Our Race Committee positioned us on the lake in an area where we had some light breeze, just enough for racing and got in one race on Saturday. On Sunday morning, we moved up the start time to 9:00am hoping for that morning breeze you get before the mid day heat kills any breeze that you might have. We had just enough breeze to get in one more race.

Joe and Stacey Brake captured first place, Don and Chris Smith were second and Bob Graves and crew Roger Sulhoff were third.

For me, this was a special weekend. I had Beau and Beckett Brake on the boat crewing for me on Saturday. Beckett decided he had enough of me on Saturday, so he jumped ship on Sunday to Mom and Dad's boat. For years, I had been waiting on the event where I could have Beau and/or Beckett crew for me. This weekend the dream came true. It was probably a blessing that it was a light air event for me as I am not sure how we would have done in a blow. It was a great time sailing with Beau and I have lot's of stories and memories that I will cherish for a long time.

Full results are here.  Here is a link to a cool video recap of the event. https://youtu.be/i2xNtz7dKaI

Mark your calendar for next year's event scheduled for October 12-14, 2018.