At some point in September of this year, I was sitting about, reading online updates from favorite sailing websites, and noticed on SailingAnarchy.com that they were hosting a Regatta in San Diego near the end of September. With a far-too-typical hiatus of gainful employment, I approached Brett with an idea.
“Hey, Sailing Anarchy is having a Regatta in Dago. We should film it.”
“Yes, we should.”
That settled, we contacted SA and asked how we could help. They were excited to have a team of experienced videographers, particularly ones with as much time shooting on the water. After all, it’s what we do.
The Regatta was the Second Annual International Sportboat Anarchy Festival, hosted by Sailing Anarchy. It is a play on words to one of sailing’s governing bodies, the ISAF, with whom Sailing Anarchy does not get along too well.
So, as is typical, Sailing Anarchy flew in the face of convention and held their own Regatta, a three-day event hosted by the Coronado Yacht Club, in Coronado (San Diego), California.
The official races were held only Saturday and Sunday, but there was additional racing on Friday, which we missed thanks to a meeting in Hell A.
We arrived in Coronado Saturday morning, and after fortifying ourselves with some Guinness at the Yacht Club Bar, we arranged to go out on some chase boats.
With two cameras, I went on the powerboat “Son of Anarchy,” the official media boat, and Brett went on one of the Race Committee boats.
Also on the media boat was Alan Block, AKA Mr. Clean, who runs Sailing Anarchy’s popular On The Water Anarchy segment, which broadcasts live racing online.
Also onboard, we had Alan’s pro photographer wife Meredith, another pro sailing photographer Dennis St. Onge, AKA Da Woody, and our driver, who, despite not crashing into anyone, shall remain nameless.
I shot HD footage of the action with my camera, and also assisted Alan with the live feed, something I had never done before. With a whack of Tecates in the boat’s reefer, we quickly learned how to work around each other, as we had two still photographers and two video cameras, one on a giant tripod, working at all times.
Alan did a great job of narrating the action as it unfolded. I learned a ton shooting the live feed, which was great fun. I’ve filmed on the water for over 10 years, but shooting for a promo and a live feed are wildly different. Add to the mix that Alan kept asking me questions while sticking the microphone in my face, it was a challenge, indeed. Luckily, those watching the feed online really enjoyed it.
There were two courses set up, one for the big boats, and one for the smaller ones. The big boat fleet saw everything from J-125’s to Viper 640s. There were two different starts for the big boats, with the big J’s and FT10s dominating, and the second wave of Vipers and FT 7.5s representing their classes well.
The small boat fleet saw a great turnout of 505s, Moths, and Wetas. The Moths, in particular, were insanely fun to watch, as they could power up to over 15 knots in the 8-10 knot breezes over the weekend.
Saturday night saw the delicious Blind Squirrel Rum Girls handing out free samples, a kickass band, and I don’t remember too much after that point, except being cornered by a girl making balloon animals and being slightly afraid.
Sunday saw perfect conditions for South Bay, and after some vodka and energy drinks to clear my hungover cranium, I again headed out on Son of Anarchy for more footage. Brett had our A camera this time, and was ensconced on one of the committee boats, where an abundance of rum was flowing.
I concentrated on the live shots, attempting to boost my skills. Again, the online viewers were happy. And I didn’t even drop the camera in the water, so that was another plus.
After the awards ceremony, Brett and I chatted with some of the members of the Coronado Yacht Club – really great people. We also had an opportunity to chat with Alec Steward, founder of Velocitek, a company that makes GPS-based devices for racing sailors. We filmed him describing the ProStart, a device for measuring distance-to-starting line.
Upon returning to the studio, we put together this video, recapping the action of the weekend.
We also remained in contact with Alec, and agreed to cut together two videos for Velocitek. This, of the ProStart:
And this one cut together from existing footage:
With a great variety of boats present at the Regatta, we put out inquiries to the manufacturers, armed with a lot of stock footage of the boats in action.
We heard back from Flying Tiger Boats, who is launching a new website soon. We put this together for them.
All told, despite the damage to our livers, the Regatta was a great experience. Lots of great people, good food, abundant alcohol, and great racing.
Kudos to Sailing Anarchy for putting on such a great event. See you next year.
