2022 Classic Moth Midwinters

Back again, at least for the moment. Been off keeping myself amused with various non-sailing, non-social larks during COVID-time. I'll try to post to Earwigoagin irregularly, particularly if it is easy; if stuff lands in my lap.

John Z went off down south for the Classic Moth Midwinters and relays the news. Weather was beautiful in Gulfport, Florida; sunny 80F (26C), light winds in the morning with the regular breeze clocking in for the afternoon. Nine Classic Moths showed up with the CMBA resident professional and all-around nice guy, Jeff Linton, again making off with top honors. Shore photos are from John Zseleczky and on-the-water photos from Amy Linton (which I have converted to black and white in my own fashion).

(George Albaugh has his more extensive Midwinter report up on his blog.)

George Albaugh with his wooden Europe on the Gulfport YC dinghy lawn.

Greg Duncan rigging his glass Europe.

Jamey Rabbit with no. 134, his new modified Mistral design. Jamey had teething problems on Saturday but came back strong on Sunday, posting 1st's and 2nd's. Jamey started this project back in 2015, seven years to completion, which is getting into my extended time frame for boat projects. In the photo below, you can definitely see he pinched in the topsides up forward. (Compare to the standard Mistral shape of Joe Bosquet, no. 48, in the background.)

Jamey Rabbit rigging. His new Classic Moth has carbon bits and bobs all over the place. The aft deck looks like you could launch drones off it. Jamey documented his Classic Moth build over at his Blackberry Boatworks blog.

John Z motoring upwind. John would finish 2nd to Jeff in Gen II.

Mark Saunders in his modified wood-redecked Europe giving Jamey Rabbit a run for his money. Mark would win the Gen 1 division.

Mark Saunders in his Europe upwind. From this angle looks very similar to my Maser. I've been looking at film photography recently and somehow I rendered this photo in Photoshop very much in the ethos of Japanese street photographer, Daido Moriyama; very contrasty with bright highlights and darker darks.

A start. Jeff Linton, no.102, has already got a nice jump on the fleet.

Mike Parsons catching up with Rod Koch (the other Rod). Rod, along with Jeff is a past Sunfish champion. Rod raced a modified Europe back around the 2010 time frame.

Joe Bousquet holding a slim lead over Jeff Linton at the reach mark.

Mark Saunders in his Gen 1 Europe holding off the faster Gen II Mistrals of Mike Parsons and Joe Bousquet.

2020 Classic Moth Nationals

Lloyd Griffin

The 2020 Classic Moth Nationals in Elizabeth City was a drift-fest, with racing only on Saturday. The 2020 Nationals were postponed for one month because of concerns over too much wind from the remnants of one hurricane. Ironically the rescheduled Nationals had the wind sucked out of Elizabeth City by the passing of the remanants of another hurricane.

As usual, George A. over at Mid-Atlantic Musings has the complete report.

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Results (top twelve) of the 2020 Classic Moth Nationals. Congrats to Mike Parsons, the 2020 champion, George Albaugh, winner of the Gen 1 division, Joe Bousquet, Masters champion, Sam Moncia, junior champion, and Emma Mayer, women's champion.

Skipper	Races	Hull Design
Mike Parsons	1,1,1,1,[2],1	Mistral
Joe Bousquet	2,2,2,2,[4],2	Mistral
Parker Purrington	3,[4],4,3,3,3	Dunand
John Zseleczky	4,5,3,[7],1,4	Mistral Y2K-mod
George Albaugh	6,3,[8],4,5,7	Wooden Europe (Gen1)
Zach Balluzo	5,[7],6,5,6,6	Mistral Y2KMod
Bob Patterson	[8],6,7,8,7,5	Shelley (Gen 1)
Sam Moncia	[9],8,5,6,9,8	Olympic Europe (Gen 1)
Emma Mayer	7,[10],9,10,10,10	Olympic Europe (Gen 1)
Matthew Panek	12,11,10,12,8,[DNF]	Olympic Europe (Gen I)
Logan Weeks	10,[13],11,9,13,11	Olympic Europe (Gen I)
Valerie Turbett	11,[14],14,11,14,9	Olympic Europe (Gen 1)

Header Photo: Classic Moths in the Mist

I started off the 2020 year with a header photo of (what else) Classic Moths racing in Sunday's early morning mist of last years Midwinter Regatta. Foreground is John Zseleczky, background is Mike Parsons.

Header Photo: 2019 Classic Moth Nationals

Ingrid Albaugh

The previous header photo was taken as the fleet crawled upwind in the light air of the 2019 Classic Moth Nationals. Twenty three Classic Moths registered for the Nationals, a definite bump-up in numbers compared with the last couple of years. This can be traced to the large number of juniors racing; the fruits of the push by E-city Mothists and Joe Bousquet to get more juniors in these great little boats. The other notable was the success overall of the Vintage class, bolstered by two experienced Mothists, Gary Gowan (Gen I winner in previous years), and John Zseleczky (top competitor in the Gen II class with a 2nd place in the Nationals) sailing Vintage this year. Walt Collins, another wily veteran, won the Gen I class, sailing his design which borrows heavily from the vintage class. The header photo shows some of the top finishers; Walt Collins, foreground, (winner Gen I), John Zseleczky, on the left, (second in Vintage), and Mike Parsons, background, (winner overall and Gen II).

I had also thrown up a header photo of John Zseleczky sailing Tweety, his yellow-decked, vintage Ventnor.

Ingrid Albaugh

The fleet off and running after one of the starts.

Ingrid Albaugh

George A. has the comprehensive report on the Nationals on his blog.

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Overall results. Mike Parsons in his Mistral took home the overall trophy.

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Worth re-posting one of my favorite videos from the E-City Nationals, this one from 2010.

Header Photo: Champion at Work

The following header photo is of perennial Classic Moth champion, Floridian Jeff Linton, rolling downwind in his modified Mistral design, Mousetrap. I must say that Jeff is one of the most approachable, laid back, sailing hot-shots I've ever come across. He is also one of the few hot-shots (maybe the only one) that is comfortable doing a program where he will personally build his own racing craft out of wood; one of the reasons you can still find him racing his own build Classic Moth.

Jeff controlling two competitors upwind in the recently completed 2019 Classic Moth Midwinters.

Len Parker

And another photo of Jeff from the 2011 E-City Nationals.

Len Parker

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I'm trying to catch up on items I have conveniently put on the back-burner on this blog.

Here are the Results of the 2018 Classic Moth Nationals - about 6 months late:

Skipper	Races	Hull Design
Joe Bousquet	1,3,1,1,1,[3],1	Swiss Dunand
Mike Parsons	2,1,2,2,2,2,[2]	Mistral
John Zseleczky	3,2,3,3,3,1,[3]	Y2K Mistral
Zach Balluzo	4,5,5,5,4,5,[8]	Y2K Mistral
George Albaugh	5,4,6,4,7,4,[9]	Europe Wood (Gen I winner)
Erik Albaugh	7,6,4,[8],8,7,4	Olympic Europe (Gen 1)
Sam Moncia	[8],7,8,6,6,6,6	Olympic Europe (Gen 1)
Dan Janeway	[9],8,9,9,9,9,5	Ventnor (Vintage winner)
Josh Kiggans	6,9,7,7,5,DNS,[DNS]	Mistral
Bill Boyle	10,10,10,10,11,10,[12]	Abbott (Vintage)
Don Hewitt	11,11,12,11,10,[13],11	Connecticut (Vintage)
C. Hatcher	13,13,[14],12,13,12,7	Post Ara (Vintage)

• Joe Bousquet and the Swiss Dunand Moth.
• Another Linton Header Photo.
• And another Linton Header Photo.

The Swiss Dunand Classic Moth

Moth Classique, 2018 Classic Moth Nationals

At the 2018 Classic Moth Nationals, for the first time in about twenty years, a hull design other than the Mistral won the Gen II class (faster designs). Joe Bousquet took a dilapidated Swiss Dunand Moth, (a fiberglass Swiss hull built by Fletcher Marine), rehabbed it with his signature tub cockpit, and proceeded to win easily in very light airs.

This is Blair Fletcher in the original plywood Swiss Dunand Moth he purchased from the Swiss after they won the World Championship in 1965 at Cape May, New Jersey.

As seen below on Joe's double-deck trailer, the Swiss Dunand (top) and the Mistral (bottom) share very much the same rocker line and the midship V-shape is also very similar. The differences are the Swiss Moth has much fuller bow sections, there is a topside chine on the Swiss Moth, and the stern is V-shaped vs. the semi-circular transom on the Mistral. The Swiss Moth also has more freeboard.
 

Joe pioneered the swoopy tub cockpit on the his first Mistral, Try-Umph, back in the late 1990's and put the same cockpit on the Swiss Moth. (Almost all the Mistral's built since have the same cockpit.)

Joe going upwind in as much breeze as showed up at the 2018 E-City Nationals. Joe had to sit much further forward on the Swiss Moth to keep the full bows in the water.

Another view of the full bow of the Swiss Moth.

Joe in Swiss Miss (2379), to the right of the Mistrals of  Mike Parsons (70) and John Zseleczky (111).

The lines for the Swiss Dunand Moth showed up on Louis Pillon's Moth website and are reproduced below. It appears that some anonymous Moth nerd has fed the Swiss Moth lines through some hull fairing program. If you want to print, use the top right arrows pop-out icon to put this into another tab on your browser.

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See this post for Bertrand Warion's fiberglass Dunand variant.

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2018 Classic Moth Nationals

George A. over at the Mid-Atlantic Musings blog did a three part series on the 2018 Classic Moth Nationals with plenty of photos. Click on the links below to read through his reports.

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3

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Header Photo: Classic Moth Nationals 2017

The previous header photo was taken before one of the start at this years 2017 Classic Moth Nationals. As you can see the event was competed in light air, though there was enough oomph in the breeze for Race Officer Greg Duncan to get 11 short races off. Mike Parsons won the Gen II division and the overall title, Walt Collins won the Gen I division and Don Janeway won the Vintage division. Fifteen Classics entered though there wasn't fifteen on the line at any one time as some had other stuff to do on Saturday and some had other stuff to do on Sunday.

The Pugh's lawn at E-City with the fleet ready to float around in the whisps and wafts of that weekend's zephyrs.

Mike Parsons, the Cooper River ace and 2017 National Champion rigging his Mistral. Behind him is a Vintage Connecticut.

Results for the 2017 Nationals.

Classic Moth News: Fall 2017

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For you design geeks...

Andrew Slavinskas is continuing a discussion of Classic Moth design over at Woodenboat Forums. Lots of hydrostatic analysis including some of the Tweezer design.

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New England News...

New Englander Yarrow Thorne has refurbished his Crosby Skimmer Moth and also picked up an Etchell's Connecticut Moth that was languishing up in the Northeast. Both were entered in the Archipelago Rally pursuit race in Rhode Island at the end of October. Unfortunately the Connecticut swamped and couldn't be self rescued, a bad habit of the vintage Moths since many had no built-in flotation. (Why would you worry about getting the Moth up quickly since the sailing season back then was Memorial Day to Labor Day and the water was warm.)

Yarrow racing his Skimmer Moth in the Archipelago Rally.

Photo by Rufus Van Gruisen

The Skimmer on the dock at the Rally.

Photo by Rufus Van Gruisen

The advantage of vintage Classic Moths is they float upright when moored out. Yarrow's fleet; the Connecticut is in the backgroud.

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Meanwhile over in Merrie Old England...

Over at the Boat Building Academy at Lyme Regis, Jake Stow is building a Mistral.

The English are busy digging 1960's Rondar Skols and mint condition Shelleys out of backyards and putting them back on the water .

Stuart Mander's barn find, a beautiful double-bottom wooden Shelley.

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A glass Skol

A Skol getting the longboard treatment.

Jim Champ has launched his UnSkol with the new hull sections he designed.

Ian Marshall has had a successful run in the English CVRDA (Classic/Vintage Racing Dinghy Association) events, sailing a Classic Moth Shelley Mk I with a tall rig.

The Classic Moth class has a good number of one-off designs. It was a easy class (inexpensive, un-complicated, with the freedom to build in wood) to show that you had invented a better mouse-trap.  English helms-woman Vanessa Weedon Jones owns this interesting double chine plywood Moth, Yellow Peril, that was professionally built in Derby. I like the free-standing wood mast.

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The Chesapeake Bay Classic Moth Fleet...

The Chesapeake Bay wrapped up the season at Chestertown with the Patterson Regatta in mid-October where we had 11 Classic Moths. Even the blogmeister was finally able to get his Maser together for that regatta. (The last two years, this is the only Classic Moth regatta I've been able to make.) Mike Parsons, this year's National Champ, continued his run at the top of the podium with a clear win in the Patterson.

An indistinct I-Phone photo of the fleet on Chester River in gentle breezes for the 2017 Patterson Cup.

Here is a photo from Earwigoagin's archives of the blogmeister with two of his Classic Moth's, a modified Stockholm Sprite and the Tweezer at the 2009 Chestertown/Patterson Regatta. (Both no longer in my fleet.) Joe Bousquet is adding some welcome informed advice. I always liked the yellow painted spar of Energizer (the Stockholm Sprite on the left, the spar was a cut down Finn spar.)

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Post about Classic Moth plans over here.

Header Photo: Start at the 2017 Classic Moth Midwinters

The previous header photos was of one of the starts at the 2017 Classic Moth Midwinters, held at Gulfport, Florida over the weekend of February 25 and 26. Reports back from the attendees was of warm, sunny weather, with light to moderate breezes. Our perennial champion, Jeff Linton from Davis Island Y.C., made one of his occasional appearances to win the Gen II division and the regatta overall. The Gen I division was entirely a fiberglass Europe Dinghy division and was won by Frickie Martschink from Charleston.

George Albaugh, over at Mid-Atlantic Musings, attended the regatta and wrote a detailed post with lots of photographs.

I've lifted a couple of photos from George's blog to repost here as well as two photos from John Z. Photos with no attribution are either by Len Parker or Amy Smith Linton.

The entrance to Gulfport Y.C on Boca Ciega Bay.

John Zseleczky

What a champion does; execute a perfect port tack on the leeward end of the start line. John Z. to leeward in 111 does the same. Mark Saunders on starboard couldn't quite get to Jeff.

Jeff Linton's downwind form.

Occasionally a Gen 1 Moth will beat a top Gen II Mistral to the weather mark. Here, Fricke Martschink, Gen 1 winner, leads John Z. The Gen II almost always blow by on the first reach.

I was told the Charleston S.C. fleet expropriated this massive trailer from their yacht club to transport four of their Europe Moths to the regatta.

John Zseleczky

Gen I Results

Skipper	Races	Hull Design
Frickie Martschink	3,1,2,1,[4],1,1,1,4,1,1	Europe
George Albaugh	1,2,5,5,[8],4,4,3,3,5,2	Europe
Woody Kapp	DNF,5,1,2,1,6,6,4,[OCS],2,3	Europe
Tom Kapp	4,[8],4,7,6,5,5,5,1,3,4	Europe
Rutlege Young	6,7,7,3,5,3,[DNF],2,2,4,5	Europe
Lewis Hay	2,3,3,4,3,2,2,[DNC],DNC,DNC,DNC	Europe
Randell Stoney	5,6,6,6,7,7,3,[DNC],DNC,DNC,DNC	Europe
Greg Duncan	7,4,8,8,2,8,7,[DNC],DNC,DNC,DNC	Europe

Gen II Results

Skipper	Races	Hull Design
Jeff Linton	1,2,1,1,1,2,1,1,[3],3,1	Mod Mistral - Mousetrap
John Zseleczky	[4],3,3,4,4,3,3,2,1,2,2	Mod Mistral - Y2K Bug
Mark Saunders	2,1,2,2,2,1,2,[DNF],DNC,DNC,DNC	Standard Mistral
Mike Parsons	3,[4],4,3,3,4,4,3,2,1,3	Standard Mistral
Erik Albaugh	[5],5,5,5,5,5,4,4,4,4	Mod Mistral - Savannah

Header Photo: Classic Moth E-City Nationals 2016

Darin McCauley

The previous header photo was taken by professional photographer, Darin McCauley, at this year's Classic Moth Nationals at Elizabeth City. If you look closely, you can see this photo was captured just a millisecond after the point of no return, witnessed by the still present trail of water coming off the tip of the daggerboard. (Also many thanks to Jay Yerkes for performing this difficult athletic maneuver so elegantly.)

I didn't make this year's Nationals because, for most of the summer, my head wasn't into racing. Turnout was off this year for the Nationals but the local fleets in Maryland and South Carolina are gaining strength with local regattas featuring 11 Classic Moths - so a bit of a trade-off.

I feature several other of Darin's excellent photos below. Just a quick plug for Darin, he writes;

"If you know of anyone who could use photographic coverage of any sailing event please let them know I'm available!"

To reach Darin McCauley - DMC@darinmccauley.com

Bill Boyle debuted his brand new woodie - a cedar-strip Europe Dinghy, one of two home-built Moths seeing their first Nationals. Bill is slated to build a second one over this winter. Click here for Bill's website on the Europe build.

Darin McCauley

John Zseleczky (on the right) debuted the second home-built woodie, his Y2K-mod Mistral, and finished 2nd overall. His build was documented here.

Darin McCauley

Blogger George Albaugh finished 3rd in the Gen 1 class with his Olympic Europe Dinghy. George's more complete report on the 2016 Classic Moth Nationals can  be found here.

Darin McCauley

Gary Gowan won the Gen I division in his home-built, woodie, modified Cates (he actually finished third overall which I think is a first for a Gen I since we started slotting the slower designs into their own division).

Darin McCauley

Finally, not a Darin McCauley photo, but one by John Z, of his new Moth with the race area on the Pasquotank River in the background.

John Zseleczky

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Results of the 2016 Classic Moth Nationals. Congrats to Mike Parsons, the 2016 champion.

Skipper	Races	Hull Design
Mike Parsons	1,1,1,1,2,2,3,[3],2	Mistral
John Zseleczky	2,2,2,2,1,3,2,2,[3]	(New) Mistral -Y2Kmod
Gary Gowans	5,4,4,5,3,4,7,6,[7]	Cates - mod (Gen I)
Bob Patterson	6,5,5,3,4,8,8,[8],4	Patterson Shelley (Gen I)
Walt Collins	4,3,3,6,13,5,6,4,[13]	Feather - mod Ventnor (Gen I)
George Albaugh	7,6,6,[7],5,6,4,5,5	Olympic Europe (Gen 1)
John Pugh	3,[13],7,4,6,9,9,9,6	Olympic Europe (Gen 1)
Joe Bousquet	13,13,13,13,13],1,1,1,1	Mistral
Zach Balluzo	9,8,9,8,7,7,5,7,[9]	Mistral
Bill Boyle	8,7,8,9,8,10,10,[10],8	(New) Woodie Europe (Gen I)
Don Hewitt	10,12,13,13,12,12,[13],11,10	Olympic Europe (Gen I)
Jay Yerkes	13,13,12,10,9,11,DSQ,12,13	Mistral

For the first time in a while, there were no vintage Classic Moths racing in 2016. It is also interesting that 9 out of the 12 competing were wooden dinghies.