by Bruce Van Deventer
Located in a bay in Northeast Sicily and flanked by two large hills, Mondello is a quiet suburb of Palermo. The beach is sandy and slopes gently to into the azure sea. Club Canottierri Roggero di Lauria sits at the far east side, and every morning (but not too early) the bronzed, middle-aged regulars come by for a swim, to sunbathe, and a bite to eat. But for two weeks in October the whole beach was taken up by 505's, two rows deep. They were all there, 120 of them, including three boats from the Northwest, to contest the 2008 505 World Championship.
Seattle resident and Italian-American Vincenzo Lalli and I are fairly light, so we were looking for a light-air regatta, but we got too much of a good thing, as high pressure was parked over Central Europe for the duration of the regatta. We spent the first two days unpacking the boat from the container, having it measured, rigging, and practice sailing. Our first bad news was that someone had stolen the dolly that we use to transport the boat to and from the water, so we spent the entire regatta carrying the boat in and out of the water.
The first day of racing set the stage for the whole event. Winds were very light and shifty, and with 120 boats on the same course, having a good start and a clear lane were vital, and I got neither. The second race was abandoned for lack of wind. On the second day, only 40 boats finished the second race within the time limit. On the third day, the windiest, we got maybe 10 knots, which let us wire reach on the reaching legs (the 505 World's course always having a triangle) but I did no better at starting.
By mid-regatta, on the lay day, veteran Brit Ian Pinnell had the event pretty much locked up, having only 6 points, with the next boat having 23. We spent the day being touristy, visiting Quattro Canti square in Palermo and nearby Monreale Cathedral.
The next day, race 6, I finally got a good start but squandered it by pushing hard to the right side of the course when the left side was favored. This unfortunately was the last day of racing; there was no wind on the next two days. On Saturday we consoled ourselves by hot-rodding around the island in my rental turbo diesel Renault Megane (why can't we get cool cars like that here?), visiting the ancient Greek temple at Segesta and the hilltop town of Erice, near where "Oceans 12" was filmed. The boat was packed away in the container, next a long day in airplanes, and before I knew it I was already under the dark, brooding skies back home. Just like all those Germans.
Editor's Note: Bruce Van Deventer has been a member of CYC since 2000 and is a former fleet captain/race.