Good morning all,

I hope everyone had an enjoyable Thanksgiving and are looking forward to DF95 gifts under the Christmas tree!  

Attached you will find an outline for a 2023 DF95 New England Traveler Trophy series that Rob Hill and I have been working on over the last several weeks. The ‘regatta light’ series is loosely structured after the Texas and Florida models. Our hope is that we can encourage the region’s sailors to travel to a series of one day events to increase regional participation and earn points towards national ranking. This approach avoids the costs associated with a two day regatta requiring hotel and meal expenditures. 

Rob and I felt it was important to get this notice out now, prior to the new year as many clubs have winter meetings to set their upcoming schedules. 

Once you have reviewed the outline I would ask you to do several things: 

Provide feedback to Rob and I on the plan. Use ‘reply all’ so that we can have a regional discussion  about going forward. 

Distribute the plan to your club membership for their review and feedback

At you winter club/organization meeting, discuss dates the club is willing to host an event

The DF95 is a great boat and there is a lot of club racing here in New England. I’ve sailed with three clubs outside of my normal sailing venue here in Newport and I have to say that there are a lot of good sailors out there. Let’s try to give those sailors broader experience by sailing in different venues. 

More to come!  Looking forward to hearing from you!

Henry DiPietro

Director, DF95 Region 1

Email: df95.reg01@gmail.com

2023 Patriot Travelers Trophy
The Traveler Series
• Five, one day events spread across eastern New England running from
May to September or October
• There would be one regatta per month.
• Each regatta is a one day event, Saturday the primary with Sunday as
the rain date.
• Each regatta would have a first warning at 11 am with no race starts after
3 pm.
• The entire series would count as a single regional scoring event towards
national points ranking and would require a minimum of ten(10) boats per
event to qualify.
• The events are open to all registered DF95 skippers
• A skipper can use 4 of the five (or six) events toward national points
• Structure the series to provide a wide range of sailing experiences: fresh
& salt water, heavy and light wind venues, rural and urban settings
Organizing Authority Responsibilities
• Develop schedule based on club inputs • Develop and post NORs
• Manage event registration
• Provide prizes for podium finishes
• Manage national points standing
Host group responsibilities
• Have the club schedule and commit to a TT event • Provide location and course
• Provide a race director (optional)
• Provide a scorekeeper
• If possible, provide a chase boat
Competitors
$10 entry fee to cover cost of prizes Food & beverage – BYO

The meeting was held after a delicious lunch of hamburgers and hot dogs prepared by Kathy Melven and Marge Fuller. Coleslaw was prepared by Pat Hanna. Many, many thanks, ladies. They received a well-deserved round of applause.

The members attending were Bill David, Henry DiPietro, Jim Fuller, Kim Hanna, Rob Hill, Jim Kelly, Wilkie Marvel, Dick Mahoney, Danny McHugh, Paul Mercer, Bill and Shelley Northup, Will Plante, Bill Raposa, Al Sampson, David Vigeant and me. Also invited were Judy David, Connie Sampson and Mary Anne Plante.

Apologies for absence had been received from Nick Bailey, Pat Donovan, Rich Field, Ed Haddad, Al Meyer and Ned Popovic.

Derek welcomed those attending. It was a good turnout and we were especially happy to see Will Plante. We thanked Will for donating his DF95 (Sail number 92) to the club.

Kim gave the treasurer’s report and said that paid membership stood at 23 and that, before paying for the lunch, our treasure chest contained $3,064.

Soling Fleet Captain, Bill Raposa said that it is a crazy year for weather disruptions and generally only 4 to 8 Solings have been racing. So, more Solings, please.

Rob Hill gave the report as DF95 Fleet Captain and said that there was generally a good DF95 turnout, typically 10 to 12.  The lack of wind this morning was disappointing and maybe we should switch to afternoon racing if the morning wind forecast looks bad, We agreed to give it a trial.

Alerts will be posted on our website mhbmyc.org

Paul proposed that we acquire more buoys so that we can put them in our racing area such that we can configure appropriate courses whatever the wind conditions  and can leave them in position for the entire season. We approved this idea. The current marks were purchased from Hamilton Marine. Rob will decide what we need and Wilkie will collect them from Hamilton as he intends to be in this area. 

Al flagged up that there is a hole in the rescue boat that needs to be repaired. Rob volunteered to add this to his list of boat projects.

Rob led the discussion on the format of the regattas. He proposed that we run six races in the morning with a short break after three and do the same in the afternoon. No entry forms and no entry fee. Just turn up. Bring your own lunch. Soft drinks will be provided by the club, possibly beer after the last race.  The low scoring method will be used with prizes for the top three places. Rob will be the Race Director for the Soling Regatta and Derek for the DF95 event.

The Soling Regatta was originally planned for September 20th, but Bill Raposa will be out of the country then. It’s unthinkable that we could hold the Soling Regatta without our Fleet Captain so we all agreed to bring it forward to Tuesday September 13th

The DF95 Regatta will be held as originally planned on Thursday, September 22nd.

Derek led the discussion concerning the Annual Awards Banquet to be held in the Village Clubhouse on Sunday, September 25th at 6.00 pm. This is a potluck event with husbands and wives of members invited. Emails to me please of what you intend to bring and Kathy will make sense of it all. Bill Raposa has been a stalwart in the preparation of the banquet, but he’ll be away so Kim and I will take on the task. The club will prepare the room and provide beer, wine, soft drinks and water.

It was decided that the existing club officers will continue in their roles at least until our kick-off meeting next spring.

Under “any other business” , Derek suggested that he bring the boards in the clubhouse lobby up to date. They run up to the date when we started to run two classes of boats, 2019. This was agreed.

Rob said that the Soling in the lobby also wanted some attention and he agreed to add it to his projects list. He was also asked if he could scrutinise Will’s boat before the club puts it up for sale. He added it to his project list!

At this point, the meeting was declared over. I think everyone left happy.

Keep smiling,

Derek