Lake Champlain Yacht Club proudly invites you to our first annual Viper 640 Regatta!
We are a friendly and informal club with excellent racing and terrific race management. Late September on Lake Champlain offers some of the best wind and most beautiful scenery. We are hoping to have guest teams from Canada, Marblehead, Newport, Lake George, Long Island Sound, the Great Lakes and elsewhere.
Date: Saturday, September 27th and Sunday, September 28th, 2014
Location: Lake Champlain Yacht Club, Shelburne, VT, USA
All the event info and registration is here:
http://lcyc.info/events/viper
Please let me know if you have any questions or issues registering!
Cheers,
Jason Hyerstay
In like Flynn! It took a little while before the registration went through--so if anyone has any issues there, I think the LCYC needs to approve you before you can get to the registration screen; just be patient.
This is going to be a fun regatta, I'm looking forward to it!
Excellent! Peter Beardsley has also signed up. We are looking forward to seeing you guys.
I'm the webmaster for the site, so I am approving the accounts as soon as I see the automated emails! Please let me know if you have any problems.
We have some housing available and we will work on finding more as needed. Cole, do you need a place to stay for you and your crew?
Cheers,
jason
Actually--it would be awesome if someone is willing to let me and my crew stay with them Friday and Saturday nights..!
Email sent!
If you are in the northeast, please think about signing up. We have made the event as cheap as possible, and we are trying to provide free housing with club members for as many guests as we can. This is a pure Viper 640 event, with no other classes competing, so we hope to get off as many races as possible in our two-day regatta. Lake Champlain is a beautiful venue, and the club really wants this to succeed and become an annual event.
Thanks,
Jason Hyerstay
Jason
I would like to sign up but have no patience navigating your website. pls sign me up. Also if you can find housing for 3 people would be great . thanks. Peter Broszkowski Viper 193
Jason,
Signed up and paid the fee but haven't heard back. Hope it went through. Accomodations for two of us, Jeff and Charlotte, would be great. We're looking forward to some serious fun.
Bob Bowditch, Dragon Lady #136.
Hi Bob,
Your name is on the list on the event page! If you didn't get a confirmation email, check your spam folder. I'll look for housing for you too. Thanks for signing up! Please tell your Viper friends.
Cheers,
Jason
Jason,
Thanks, glad we're signed up. I don't need accomodations so save the space for someone else. We just need it for two people, Jeff and Charlotte. Thanks again.
Bob
Bob, are you planning on doing HPDO too? I have approval from the club leadership for storage of up to six boats coming from the north who want to leave their boats for HPDO.
Cheers,
jason
Jason,
Might be good. Let you know soon but if you fill up before I get back to you, no problem. Thanks.
Bob
We are up to eight boats registered and paid now! Paul Z. just emailed that he would attend, and Dave N. has created an account on our site. Justin Scott introduced me to Viper sailing, and I would love to have him attend!
We already have more boats than CORK, and with only Vipers on the line, I think we can get in a lot of racing in two days! We are a very low-key club, with excellent race management and a gorgeous venue. Please come up for a great weekend just as the leaves are turning in Vermont and the wind speed is building!
I am working on arranging more member housing, but even if you have to get a hotel, it will be cheap and 5-15 minutes away.
The club grounds are small, and all we do is racing and cruising, no tennis, no bar, no restaurant. You will be no more than one minute from your boat, your car, the bathroom, or the docks. I would recommend fenders if we stay in the water, and we ramp launch (no lift). If you are gun-shy on the ramp, we'll happily launch your boat for you!
The Shelburne Shipyard is under five minutes away if you need gear, and West Marine is ten minutes away. I have the local townie bar, the Old Shed, ready for us on Saturday night, and I'll make sure they have quality rum. We'll be providing dinner and beer on Saturday, bagel breakfasts both race mornings, and the club is BYOB if you want to bring your own refreshments!
Cheers,
Jason
We are now up to ten registrants with two more on the fence! We are really looking forward to hosting a great event!
Cheers,
Jason
Anyone available to crew Sunday only?
We are sailing 4-up and if needed could throw you one of our people if Jason and Mark can't find someone local. We'll figure it out, great to hear you're coming to VT.
I have several people available. Let me confirm availability.
I'm hoping Ben Steinberg will be signing up too. He thought he might be able to do this one. It would be cool if he could sell #22 to someone up here!
Cheers,
Jason
I only have time for a quick message, but I want to thank everyone who came up to race! We really enjoyed hosting this regatta and it was a privilege to get to race with you guys on our home waters. we hope you will all return in 2015!
Cheers,
Jason
Jason - Huge thanks to you and your team at LCYC. You guys simply knocked it out of the park for your first Viper regatta. This is obviously not your first rodeo and this event is immediately up there with Wickford as the best small club event in the northeast.
Sailing out on Lake Champlain yesterday was stunningly beautiful. Sometimes I found myself just looking around, rather than watching the tell tales! Hopefully there will be some good photos to share with those who couldn't make it.
Looking forward to next year!
Dave/Steve/OJ
I have to echo Dave's comments. I have not been racing much this season, but this regatta made me realize what I love about it. This has to rate up there as one of my all time favorite events. Well done Jason, Dale and crew. I felt like I was at summer camp , except at camp, the counselors did not come out and distribute Long Trail Ale and Vermont cheese and crackers as we were rigging and de-rigging boats. Lastly, passing out Long Trail on the tows in was a nice touch.
Jason,
I have to echo the comments of others; wonderful regatta in every respect. Jeff, Charlotte and I had a great time and will definitely be back for the second annual. It's got me thinking that we should do one up in our neck of the woods in Maine but you've set the bar awfully high. Please thank all the folks who put in so much time and effort to cover all, and I mean all,
the details. I hope you enjoyed it; we sure as hell did!
Bob Bowditch
Thanks a lot guys! This feedback means a lot. We are exchanging regatta debrief emails, and it feels good to hear from the guests that we exceeded expectations. We really tried hard to treat this event not just as a single event, but the start of a long-running tradition. Our club has been very supportive of this event, and we see sportboat racing as the way to bring younger racers into sailing and ensure the long-term viability of our club.
Now that you have seen our venue, we'd love to hear any tips on how we can handle additional racers. I think we should move all our lasers and extra trailers from the south side of the lot so we can park a few more boats and trailers next to our local sportboat fleet. We thought about doing a distance-based haul-out order, but folks were pretty equidistant and I think we got boats back to the lawn as quickly as possibly.
I think the customer service stuff we did in terms of beer, cheese and crackers, etc. really helped make everyone feel welcome. I had a blast racing, but also really enjoyed being a gracious host. It felt great to make everyone feel welcome and share our beautiful venue with visiting racers. I'm so glad we went out to the open lake on Sunday so we could race with the Green Mountains to the east and the Adirondacks to the west.
You guys treated our venue so well and you are all welcome back next year with open arms! Lake Champlain is now a loyal part of Viper Nation.
Cheers,
Jason
Some spectator photos from Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10204197406910467&set=p.10204197406910467&type=1&comment_id=10204205914883161&offset=0&total_comments=9
Jason, Dale and crew, thank you so much for the great event. It was really apparent you guys put in a lot of work to make this thing happen. It was really something I won't forget, racing out on the main part of the lake, with the trees turning and the Adirondacks as the backdrop--really beautiful waters up there! I'm looking forward to doing this again!
Quote from: Jason Hyerstay on September 29, 2014, 07:39:40 PM
Some spectator photos from Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10204197406910467&set=p.10204197406910467&type=1&comment_id=10204205914883161&offset=0&total_comments=9
Jason,
I can't view these photos -- not sure if it is a FB privacy setting or not. Can you maybe share the album on your FB feed?
I had her post them to our Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/lcyc.info
Cheers,
Jason
Better late than never: my fault, not Jason's: http://www.viper640.org/component/content/article/14-news/466-vermonstering-in-search-of-champ
Thanks for the write-up, Peter.
Have any of you who attended received your photos and photo discs yet?
Cheers,
Jason
Received a few days ago, haven't had a chance to open it up and check it out though. Thanks!