Stewards and Staff are volun-

teering their time away from

sailing, to keep this club one

that everyone can be proud of.

The following quote is taken

from “ A Member’s Guide to

Sailing with LMSC” on our

web site :

Club Concept: As one of our

past commodores said

(paraphrased) “If the club re-

lied on the support of only

what was required of its mem-

bers, it would have folded a

long time ago”. This is a mem-

ber managed and supported

club so take the initiative and

be a part of everything, pitch in

and volunteer!

Brooks Allen

brookscallen@gmail.com

Commodore’s Report

We have experienced a very

hot summer sailing season. De-

spite the excessive heat we con-

tinue to have good participation

in our events.

Your Board of Stewards has

focused some attention on the

Shipshape and Seaworthy re-

quirements that have been in our

By Laws for a long time. The

results of this effort show both in

the parking area and on the

docks. The Shipshape and Sea-

worthy requirements were put

into the By Laws to encourage

everyone to help with this im-

portant aspect of our club’s ap-

pearance. I would like to thank

everyone that assisted and gave

their personal time for the bene-

fit of the club. Your Board of

Upcoming Events

Oct 4 - 6 - SJ21 Nationals

Oct 12 -13 - Hospice Re-

gatta at WCSC

Oct 19 - LMSC Annual

Meeting

Oct 26 - Halloween Game

Night

Nov 2 - LMSC MC Scow

Championship

Nov 3 - LMSC Flying Scot

Championship

Inside this issue:

Flying Scot News 2

MC Scow News 3

If Anything’s Gonna 4

Dinghy Debacle 5

SAYRA 5

New Members

6

Front: Janie Gowans, Nancy Berens

Middle: Sylvia Ward, Paula Bartholomew, Kathy

Rivers Back: Debbie Weaver

HELP WANTED Your dreams of a career in journalism can now be fulfilled.

Effective with the publication of this issue, the position of

Editor of the Windword is open.

Please apply to the Commodore or Publisher.

VOLUNTEER! GIVE MORE GET MORE

Kayaking at LMSC

While the MC sailors were racing

on Wednesday evenings, a group of

women decided to go kayaking to

pass the time until the grill was lit

for dinner. It became a weekly

event and a real bonding experi-

ence. We looked forward to it, and

enjoyed it so much, we’re now on

the water on Saturdays too.

If you want to join us at 4:45pm on

Wednesday’s or 4:00pm on Satur-

day’s let me or Janie Gowans know.

Or better yet, just show up- all club

members are welcome.

Debbie Weaver

Flying Scot Fleet 158 News

Page 2

Our annual Scots on the

Rocks regatta on the clear waters of

Lake Murray, sailed concurrently with

the 2019 Carolinas District Champion-

ship, made the most of Labor Day week-

end with some seriously challenging sail-

ing conditions on Saturday followed on

Sunday by moderately fresh breezes and

pleasantly cool temperatures. Races 1, 2

and 3 presented conditions that were

fitful at times, with substantial oscilla-

tions. Sailors who changed gears quickly

between driving hard in the puffs and

sailing wide angles in the “holes” man-

aged to stay in the upper third of the

fleet. Point differences in the top half of

the fleet were tight, highlighting the oc-

casional randomness of wind holes and

oscillations. Sunday’s weather was much

brisker and very pleasantly cool. Con-

sistency paid handsomely with our series

winner never winning an individual

race! Congratulations to Sean O’Don-

nell and Crew Dave Rink on taking the

series and for taking home the perpetual

Carolinas District Championship tro-

phy. It’s theirs to convey bragging rights

at Lake Norman Yacht Club until next

year’s defense.

Mark and Michele dared to travel

to Lake Murray with hurricane Dorian

threatening Florida. A late change the

storm path made the decision reasona-

ble. After taking 4th place on Saturday,

they came roaring back to capture 2nd

in he series. Chris Herman and crew

Dale Oller maintained their third place

position handily.

Labor Day temperatures were

cooler than normal, making for great

post race camaraderie on the patio on

Saturday and reasonably pleasant

“packing for the road” temperatures on

Sunday. LMSC is pleased to have had

the opportunity to host guests from

Florida to Ohio and points be-

tween. Flying Scot competitors are a

supportive, fun oriented family of sailors

who make new and lasting friend-

ships. Fleet 158 is proud to be part of

this great sailing community.

Oh! And the BBQ was, as always,

awesome! From Fleet Captain, Ryan

Gaskin, thanks to all the LMSC volun-

teers who made this event possible.

Here’s a shout out to PRO Chris Mielke

who organized a top level race manage-

ment team for a very well run regatta.

We were especially honored that Lauren

Hinkle volunteered to take charge of all

the landside chores. She purchased and

presented all the breakfast and happy

hour goodies, arranged for Sunday lunch,

and assembled a group of volunteers to

help everything run smoothly. Chris,

Lauren, and the people who helped them

deserve our special thanks. It is members

like these that make our club the vibrant,

enjoyable organization that it is.

Flying Scot sailors have two more

opportunities to stuff those pesky MC

Scow people (I confess to being a closet

MC Scow type) in our last two Rodesiler

races of the season. Although most of we

dual fleet citizenship sailors are represent-

ing the club at the Hospice of the Upstate

in our MC Scows, Tommy and Debby

Weaver will loyally represent the LMSC

Flying Scot fleet in Dream Weaver 2. All

of us challenge LMSC members sailing any

boat to represent our club at this thor-

oughly enjoyable event supporting a very

worthy cause. Hospice of the Upstate is

an annual charity regatta hosted on Lake

Hartwell by the Western Carolina Sailing

Club. This year, the regatta will be held

on October 12th and 13th. Add your

presence to our fleet numbers and we

could easily be the largest out of town

club representation for 2019. Check the

WCSC website for more information:

http://www.wcsc-sailing.org/

Ryan Gaskin, Fleet Captain

r98gaskin@gmail.com

Page 3

MC Scow Fleet 89 News

The 16 foot MC Scow is one of the

most popular and fastest growing one

design boats in the US today. With

over 100 registered fleets, local, region-

al, and national competition keeps the

MC Class growing at a rapid pace. Ad-

ditionally, the MC Scow class has sepa-

rate sailing divisions based on age from

the youth division, (under 21) to the

Old Salt Division, (over 80!) The boat

is easy to rig, launch, retrieve, and a

blast to sail!

The Lake Murray Sailing Club in Chapin

SC. has a large and very active fleet of

MC Scows. The first scow appeared in

the summer of 2007 and today there

are now 33 boats in LMSC’s Fleet #89.

Many opportunities exist at LMSC to

enjoy sailing the MC Scow, including

every Wednesday for coaching, racing,

or just plain fun sailing, every two

weeks on Saturday or Sunday, competi-

tive racing over short courses, fantastic

fun! LMSC also sponsors “club races

throughout the spring, summer and fall,

where the MC Scows compete with

other one design boats of similar size

and performance.

Consider the following:

If you want one-design sailing at its best

If you want to compete and avoid an

“arms race” of “go fasts”

If you want to just enjoy sailing around

the lake without the hassle of owning a

“cruiser”

If you want to race competitively in

local “club” races with people of similar

interest

If you want a boat with very modest

startup costs for a competitive boat

If you want to “fleet” race or “team”

race with a great group of people

If you want a boat that does not RE-

QUIRE crew (but can have crew if de-

sired)

If you want a boat that is fast, respon-

sive, and a blast to sail

If you want to improve your sailing skill-

set

If you want a boat with a strong nation-

al organization and a solid builder to

protect your investment

If you want a boat that is easy to rig,

launch, and retrieve

The MC Scow might be the boat for

you!

Today is the last day of summer, and it

was our last Summer series MC

event, breezes were excellent when we

set up the course, but as we

sounded the warning signal, the breeze

started to die off! Only one

race (?) if you could call it that!

Results: RG, CB, TB, FMc, BE, CM, AG,

JH, TK, Cary/Geri Palmer.

Fall series starts in late October, more

to follow on that.

Wednesday LOES, spectacular turn-out

last Wednesday, 14 boats in great

breezes, one unfortunate accident/

lesson, a sailor went out without

their mast head float, and capsized, boat

turned turtle in about 30

seconds, required major rescue effort

and the end of sailing for the

day, Floatie is like the American Express

Card, don't leave home/dock

without it!!

LOES this Wednesday starting at 10

2 Fleet personal items, Bud had his an-

ticipated surgical procedure on

Friday and was at LMSC today, (not

sailing) but expect him back in a

few weeks, Cindy Damon is scheduled

for her hip replacement on

Wednesday this week, needless to say,

Butch may not make it to sail on

Wednesday! Lets keep these folks in

our thoughts.

Hospice Regatta in 3 weeks, looks like a

good contingent from Fleet 89

will again make the trip,register on line,

it is a worthy event, plus

a good fleet building time. Hope to have

some golf carts to

facilitate launching and retrieving boats.

Our fleet championship is scheduled for

the first weekend in November,

it has always been on Sunday, but this

year we are swapping days with

the Flying Scots, so we will be on Satur-

day and have a cook-out

afterwards. More to follow

Need to look at the calendar, and

schedule a "Fleet Day" where we do

some boat repairs and boat weighing,

noticed a lot of boats have some

serious dings and chips, no big deal if we

have a bunch of people

helping!

Finally, we held the regional MC regatta

last weekend, The Bottoms-Up,

only bottoms up we saw was Butch!

Good event, had 6 out of town

boats, but our local fleet members did

well against the hot shots!

Excellent RC work and lots of compli-

ments from the visitors regarding

the very simple event.

That is all for now!

Allan Gowans, Fleet Captain

If Anything’s Gonna Happen

Page 4

“If anything's gonna happen, it's

gonna happen out there.” Kurt Russell

as Captain Ron

Murphy’s Revenge is a fine old Bal-

boa 27 whose storied past would make

an article unto itself. She came into be-

ing my daughter Annabel’s boat about 18

months ago. Since then and on several

occasions, Anny has mentioned that we

needed to race her in the National Capi-

tal Region Leukemia Cup Regatta.

Preparing for the regatta scheduled

on the second weekend of September,

we had recently hauled and put a new

coat of bottom paint on the good old

boat. Then with Hurricane Dorian

threatening to do something someplace,

we strapped Murphy into the safest hur-

ricane hole available, removed all liquids

and boat bashing items from the boat,

and stripped the canvas.

By Thursday, Dorian was moving

out to sea. The Hurricane’s anti-

clockwise rotation was blowing cool dry

air due south in Virginia. So, Friday’s

confirmation of the regatta found two of

my friends on their Catalina 31 and me

on the sail-stripped Murphy, north-

bound on the Potomac River, nose into

the 30 MPH, last throw blows of Hurri-

cane Dorian.

This was likely not the best decision

I ever made, but it certainly was exciting.

Three against one may not seem

fair but Murphy’s four-stroke 9 HP out-

board seemed to be more than up to the

task coming from tide, wind, and waves.

For many, Murphy would start to cut

into the oncoming wave, then rise up,

and cut nearly rub rail deep through the

passing crest. Now and again, a second

wave would rise to slap Murphy’s as-

cending hull, momentarily stopping the

Balboa’s forward motion. But apparent-

ly, Mother Nature decided that enough

wasn’t enough.

Someplace near Indian Head, Mary-

land, a southbound wave joined up with a

south-west reflection off the Maryland

shore, only to meet up with a third

traveling south-east reverbing off the far

Virginia shore. Together, this rogue

monster lifted Murphy higher than the

boat ever should be, and slapping her

nose first with a loud thump, into a

trough that seemed to have been

sucked down halfway to the river’s bot-

tom.

Having water come over the bow

is not the usual event when sailing, but

it can happen. Having water up to the

rub-rail, isn’t all that unusual on a sail

boat. But to have water run from the

bow, over the cockpit, and over both

the port AND starboard rails AT THE

SAME TIME, was a first.

But being pooped in the Potomac

and having Murphy’s forward motion

temporarily stopped could have been

the most excitement for the day, and I’d

have been happy. But oddly, the for-

ward motion was now a backwards

motion, and then replaced by the, “hey

fool, you are headed into the windward,

rock protected shore” motion. All this

with Murphy’s motor putting away, in

gear, with the prop NOT TURNING.

My first thought was to toss out an

anchor and slow the rapidly approaching

shore. My second thought was to see

that the loud thud I heard in the middle

of all the excitement was probably an

anchor ripped from its tied-with-¼-inch

-nylon- braided-cord perch. I grabbed

the handheld radio and soon was towed

by my friends and their diesel motored,

center shaft inboard, Catalina 31.

Once towed into the National

Sailing Marina, I was able to strip off the

lower shroud of the outboard to see a

sheared vertical drive shaft. My friends

on Te-Keel-La towed us out to race,

and the next day, back to Quantico.

There, I removed the engine to bring it

home to fix.

And yes, Anny brought home a

very neat third place plaque for her

work behind the wheel at the regatta.

Robert Lang

Page 5

The Dinghy Debacle

Our friends and sailing mentors, Bud and

Jean Sweet introduced Jill and me to the

world of chartering a few ago, sailing a

Beneteau 34 out of Punta Gorda, Florida

for five nights. Bud was quite the instruc-

tor and kept us on our toes. He assigned

Jill as “Anchor Girl” and she rose to the

challenge, allowing the skipper to remain

at the helm when setting or retrieving the

anchor.

So two years later, we found ourselves

retracing our sailing trip with family. Our

daughter and son-in-law were to be our

special crew. Anna, and Juan were fairly

new to sailing but had great confidence in

Dad, the Captain.

The first night out, we selected a spot 15

feet deep, away from the Waterway traf-

fic and anchored about 400 feet off of

Gasparilla Island.

After a dingy ride to shore and dinner out,

we returned to our boat, tied the dingy to

our stern and retired.

Around midnight, the wind started picking

up and was maybe 15 to 18 knots. And

for some unknown reason, instead of the

anchor rode leading directly out from the

bow as it should, it went tight against the

hull towards the keel where it joins the

hull. This forced our vessel to take the

wind at around 40 degrees and caused

the tension of the rode to increase consid-

erably. The wind direction was not helpful

either. If our anchor slipped, we would

slide and land against riprap along the

island’s shore.

We pulled on the line by hand repeatedly

since we could not motor forward and

risk the line contacting the prop. For 30

minutes, we pulled at the line, barely

moving the boat towards the anchor.

Each time we released the line, it would

return to the same position.

So I found myself at one in the morning,

sitting in the cockpit, keeping watch on the

rocky shore as the wind gained strength.

Finally, I decided to have one last try to free

this anchor line and get some sleep and I

noticed that the dingy was hard against the

stern.

I woke everyone and said we needed to

untie the dingy to see if that would free up

the anchor line. Juan and I first held the line

but as soon as it was free of the cleat, the

dingy made a bee line for the starboard side

of the boat and onwards toward the anchor.

We were having serious trouble hanging on.

Jill and Anna quickly came to assist. So with

the four of us holding on with all we had

and close to the end of the line, we were

about to lose the dingy. So I did what any

good captain would do. I asked, “Does any-

one have an idea?”

My daughter, Anna, quickly responded,

“You’re not supposed to ask that! You are

supposed to know what to do!”

About the time it was abeam to starboard,

as if by magic, the dinghy freed itself and

everything was normal. The tension on the

dingy line was less, the boat swung around

with the anchor line directly off the bow and

the dingy drifted back behind the boat

where it belonged.

I woke up every few minutes and started

the engine at daybreak, wanting to leave

that spot as soon as I could. The rest of the

trip was terrific with great breezes, beautiful

islands, delicious food, and lots of laughs.

I have no clue how the rode became caught

up with the dingy motor and I suppose I’ll

never know. But lesson learned: put the

dingy motor on the sailboat when not in

use.

Richard Eaton

LMSC was represented in the 2019 SAY-

RA CLUB CHAMPIONSHIP by the team

of Frank McKinnon, John Harr, and Mark

Siebert in Charleston on September 14.

The Challenge was sailed in College of

Charleston J22’s from Patriot’s Point.

The tide was at max ebb, down the river,

when we sailed with the weather mark di-

rectly up river, against the tide, so the only

choice was to go onto port ASAP to get to

shallow water with minimum current, as

close to the Yorktown as possible. Just had to

be sure not to hook the mast tip on any

Yorktown parts.

If you’d done that right you could lay the

weather mark on starboard from the bow of

the Yorktown.

An unlucky rudder snag on a mark round-

ing cost the team about eight places. The

team finished thirteen out of sixteen, but

plans to return next year.

SAYRA

Board of Stewards 2018 - 2019

Commodore - Brooks Allen

Vice Commodore - Ryan Gaskin

Rear Commodore - Mike Carroll

Treasurer - Tom Berens

Secretary - Bud Buckwell

At Large Members

Chris Bowman

Steve Morris

Jim Rowan

Brad Stokes

Your bus iness tag line here.

Lake Murray Sailing Club 235 Old Forge Road

Chapin, SC 29036

Web: www.lmsc.org

Steve Morris, retiring editor

Ryan Gaskin, publisher

Visit us on the web!

www.lmsc.org

Or find us on Facebook

Page 6

Staff/Committee Chairs 2018 - 2019

Docks - John Harr

House - Tom Berens

Grounds - Kathy Rivers

Membership - Allan Gowans

Parking - Tommy Kasperski

Slips - Brad Stokes

Entertainment - Lauren Hinkle

Facility Reservations - Sam Finklea

Sailing - Tommy Weaver

Safety - Kirk Johnson

Training - Ryan Gaskin

Watercraft - Tommy Weaver

Webmaster - Ryan Gaskin

Windword - Steve Morris

LMSA Youth & Community Sailing - Allan Gowans

LMYRA Liaison - Fran Trapp

New LMSC Members

Joined LMSC in August, 2019:

Eleni & Chris Adkins

Butch & Cindy Damon

Jerome and Ann Gorman

Marc & Kathy Hanneman

Mark & Tami Swart

Joined LMSC in September, 2019:

Veronica Vogt

Cari & Jeri Palmer

Charlie & Alison Lloyd

Paul & Lori Collingwood

Click on the New Members link under the Members Area of

the LMSC website menu for an introduction.

Be sure to extend your personal welcome when you see

them at the club.

“A sailor is an artist whose medium is the wind.” - Webb Chiles