Our seventh full regatta at Loring Air Force Base came off beautifully this past week in spite of some tall hurdles. Turns out the base was double booked, the other party being a company that builds portable runway lighting systems. They are developing the latest and greatest, and needed the runways and hangar for some real world testing.

Fortunately they were gracious enough to clear out half the hangar for us, but in terms of the runways themselves they weren’t budging. That left us with the western taxiway and the backroads upon which to lay a course. To say we were mildly traumatized doesn’t begin to cover it.

Behind the Cardboard Curtain. Each box represents one runway light.

There were plenty of fun places to locate the ten checkpoints for the orienteering run; too much fun for some as not everyone found all ten. We don’t do easy at Loring. Milo Fleming won the BloKart Light class, Jeff Bugbee the BK Heavy and Jeff Roseberry the Unlimiteds. The wind for this event was ideal: 10-15 with gusts out of the NW.

Wind forecasts for the next few days were bleak. Thursday dawned dead. But by and by it filled in and the racing began. Dave Lussier figured out a good course for the BloKarts, and as the Unlimited couldn’t lay out anything better that could be run concurrently, we opted to share the course. The upside was that during the downtime all the sailors hung around together and talked land yacht. Lots of great brainstorming came out of these sessions. And as the course was short, waiting for the other class was not a burden. As always, what better place to hang out than under the big sky at Loring.

BloKarts waiting as the Unlimiteds flew past. The Unlimiteds were very competitive this regatta, with three of the five boats winning at least one race.

Same for the next day: poor forecast followed by a slow building of a wonderful breeze. Ditto Saturday. Conclusive proof of the old iceboaters adage: "show up and pray”. The pace slowed right down. Long lazy mornings, sniffing for wind, first one boat goes out: we all watch to see if he’s moving. One person thinks it might be enough and they head out. Next thing Nina is at the line, which means it’s time to line them up.
Big shout out for Nina and the superb efficiency she brought to this rather laid back pace. Once there was wind, she banged out the races until the sailors begged for mercy.

We had one long race around the perimeter of our permitted playground, short tacking up the hills and working through the lees of the big buildings. Only at Loring will you find such amazing expedition racing. One can sail around marks for only so long.

Final results below.

And here’s some not so late breaking news: Arch Hangar to become the museum?

Follow-Up Friday : Loring Air Museum rallying support to expand into historic Arch Hangar wagmtv.com

The sun goes down early this time of year at such a high latitude. Notice the little runway light on the left. They were having a hard time getting the top end of the runway to communicate with the bottom end, but then it all came together and they lit them up:

Blue for taxiway, white for landing, and moon for romance.