2023 Press Releases

At the end of the day, a regatta is all about the breeze and when the wind generously gave its all for the last race of Charleston Race Week 2023, it brought smiles to many faces and success across all fifteen fleets racing. Weather guru Shea Gibson, assisting Quantum with weather forecasting this week, commented, "The wind cooperated a couple of knots better than most modeled data. I had a good feeling about the small surge to get us towards the 10-knot mark as winds veered, so I was glad that verified. The current also cooperated by slowing down a bit over half a knot as well. All-in-all a pretty good finish for a great event."

PRO Taran Teague commented, "We had some weather challenges, we were lucky to get four races in on day 1, we had an incredible front come in on day 2 which was beautiful to watch and we managed to get two races off, then on the final day we started an hour early so all classes got their full complement of racing in. It's been another great Charleston Race Week!"

One of the larger fleets racing this year was the VX:One: with twenty-nine boats, after ten races sailed first place went to John Porter (Savannah, GA). Porter has sailed his whole life in the low country, starting out ins and his local knowledge shone through this week with a whopping twenty-five-point lead over second place. He said, "We've been working on the boat hard this past year to get it ready and it was great to go racing, the competition was great as always, and Charleston never fails to disappoint! It's been fantastic getting my old buddies back in the boat with me including Dave Himmell who I sailed with last at the 1992 trials in the Finn."

Skipper Nilah Miller is racing this week with crew Mason Baird and Sam Heighway on a RS21. It's their first time racing the boat and at the end of day two, the team from Clemson University were tied for first with a solid ten-point lead over the third place. During the regatta, the RS21 fleet has been testing the Vakaros Atlas 2 / RaceSense device, a start line tool that is quickly gaining the respect of the sailing community.

"We've been trying different things and trying to learn the boat this week and the Vakaros software has been cool," Miller said. "We like how you can ping the lines remotely and don't have to press the five-minute button anymore!"

Vakaros is a wireless instrumentation company working in the sailing world and at Charleston Race Week they have been running their new OCS Detection and Race Management Platform called RaceSense.

A day that started with dark skies and thunderstorms finally cleared well before noon but not without challenging times for both race committee and racers alike. The 186-strong Charleston Race Week fleet faced big forecast challenges today as early storms killed the winds. The south-south-west sea breeze stayed pinned to the coast and offshore, making for lighter westerlies farther inside the harbor. The breeze finally filled in later in the day and most fleets sailed two races.

Two-hour postponements were called on all courses; racing started in 7-10 knots on the outer harbor course and built steadily throughout the afternoon finishing in 12-14 knots. "It turned out to be a very good day in the end and I think most people were pleased," Bruce Bingham, principal race officer for the offshore courses, commented. "There were lots of smiles as boats crossed the finish lines."

The southeast winds were on point today on the higher end at 8-10 knots and everyone had just enough wind to work with as the 186 boats in fifteen classes got underway on day one, Charleston Race Week. According to weather guru Shea Gibson, part of the Quantum weather team, the biggest theme for the inner circles was the current which showed around the start and finish gates.

"There were both advantages and disadvantages between reaching and hauling today based on the opposing winds across the current," Gibson commented. "Lots of great tactitioners out there made it happen the right way - very impressive racing indeed!" Leading in the 39-strong J/70 fleet, Brian Keane (Weston, MA) owner/skipper of Savasana, has been racing CRW for some fifteen years, ten of those on a J/70. Nonetheless, he cites the infamous Charleston Harbor currents as being an eternal challenge.

"We're really happy about our day – it's always a challenge coming to Charleston and having to not only figure out the breeze but also the current and it was just ripping today. The competition is great, a lot of the top boats in the J/70 fleet in the country are here and a lot of them had good races. Our speed was very good but I think most of all we put ourselves in a good position relative to the current. The current really was a primary driver for the day – it's hard. But it's fun. It's a unique venue. There are not a lot of places where you sail where the current plays such a dominant role."

So, what do you tell competitors when they wish for more wind around here?

Shea Gibson smiled, "Just be patient, it will happen! I think there will be enough wind out there for everybody today."

This is Gibson's seventh year calling weather for Charleston Race Week and his fourth year working with SailFlow as a partner. He's part of the Quantum weather team on site at CRW and his thorough reporting is invaluable for sailors, especially the out-of-towners, as he provides in-depth daily forecasts and discussion about the convoluted current patterns that result from the convergence of three rivers that flow into Charleston Harbor.

"Charleston has a very unique and very diverse wind pattern based on the sea breezes here," Gibson explained. "Any different directions of onshore winds have different properties, such as today the southeast winds being lighter than what you would normally see from a south or southwest sea breeze. Even east-north-east sea breezes tend to have different properties - cooler air versus warmer air coming up from the south."

He suggests out-of-towners reach out to locals who know the sea breezes and how they fill into the harbor along with the currents. "Even some of the wave action in the offshore rings - it all matters, it's all based around wind," he added. We have a three-river system with varying scopes of current that rip through the harbor and all the way out through the jetties. Together with the breeze can make for a difficult and challenging type of racing environment."