This past weekend 7 Vipers traveled to Huntington Lake for the 57^th High Sierra Regatta. After 6-hours on the road and no AC, Team Viral arrived around 12:30 Thursday evening. The drive through the San Joaquin valley smelled strangely similar to Texas and it was just as hot there too. Tim Carter, Bryan Milne, and myself set up camp at the Dear Creek campgrounds and then walked down to the lake to see the stars. It was such a beautiful sight. I can’t remember the last time I could see the Milky Way.

Leaving Thursday evening and having all day Friday to set the boat and practice was key. We made several runs up and down the lake to get a feel for the wind, and decided that the south side of the lake would be the most favored. Huntington Lake is 7,000 feet high, which makes it a perfect mixture of cold water and warm air during the summer. There was a lot of buzz about the viper, and after our practice Tim and Bryan took a guy out for a spin. He’s been bitten. The rest of the vipers rolled in through out the day.

Momentum - Vipers in Texas

On-line registration for the event opened on April 27^th and by the 28^th eight Viper 640’s were registered for the event.  A post on the local racing forum says it all “where in the heck did the vipers come from”.  Having that many boat’s registered before there were any other two boats in a class made a very strong statement – Texas viper sailors love their boats and were excited about attending this event!

Long Beach Race Week 2010          (by Stacey Loula, aka Venomiss....Photography by David McBride)

Long Beach Race Week 2010 had one of the biggest turn outs yet with 144+ boats in 18 different classes! That being said, the Viper class saw  boats on the line including boats from Arizona and Texas with crews stretching as far away as Canada and Rhode Island.

Here's some nice coverage from the Ullman Website  http://www.ullmansails.com/news.aspx?q=250&y=2010&c=2

Tight racing in our fleet saw 1st-4th position within 2 points of each other going into the last day and though the "Long Beach Doctor" wasn't in most of the weekend, we still had decent enough breeze to make for some wild fun rides at times. The start lines were fierce, and a particular instance on Saturday stands out as we had one of those epic "uh oh...." moments one minute before the start gun when our tiller extension broke. Everyone was piling up at the pin end and we were surrounded, but on starboard tack. Before we knew it, we were turning down at a fast rate with a boat 5 feet in front of us on port tack. When we looked back wondering what our driver was thinking back there, he was sitting awestruck looking at the tiller extension that had just sheered off. Brace for the impact...  It wasn't pretty and it was definitely loud, but we collected ourselves and made it around the course with our skipper sitting in the middle of the boat steering until we could jury rig the thing back together between races. Made for a great Auto Helm on the way back in though!

On the heels of big fleets and big wind in Miami and Charleston, I invited Scott Findlay to come sail the SYC MacIntosh Cup.  He had mentioned before that he would like to get his  daughter on a Viper, so I suggested that he bring her along too.  The Mac is probably the most cozy and personal Viper regatta anywhere, so perfect for beginners and kids.   Savannah local and Viper technical chair David Guggenheim puts on a great event, helping everyone with lodging and logistics and throwing a great party Saturday night.  The whole thing is easy and comfortable on land and with great racing on the water.  Grace, a 10 year old 4th grader, had only sailed a few times, but she was willing to bear a 7+ hour drive from Boca to Savannah for a chance to sail with her dad.  All three of us together were somewhat less than 450 lbs, so we were a bit light for the Viper, and we were facing experienced fully crewed boats.  Some think the Viper is a bit of a radical boat, and must think it crazy to go out underweight with inexperienced kids.  Quite the contrary, the Viper is a stable platform and depowers easily while still driving well even in light air.  My wife and I sail club races with our kids and have a lot of fun doing it.  Besides, the wind was forecast at only 8-12, and Scott is very good with the spinnaker, so I knew we would be fine.  Turns out, we were more than fine.