Chicago Mack race sails Saturday

By Peggy Walsh-Sarnecki

July 18, 2014 at 10:55 am Chicago

Sailing on day one of the 2013 Chicago Yacht Club’s Race to Mackinac. Photo by Karen Hirsch, courtesy of the Chicago Yacht Club.

The 106th Chicago Yacht Club Race to Mackinac sets sail Saturday, with 333 boats registered to sail the 333 statute miles from the starting line just off the the Chicago Lighthouse to the finish line off Mackinac Island.

Sailors are from several states as well as Berlin, Dublin and New Zealand.

There are 27 boats from southeast Michigan that raced the Bell’s Beer Bayview Mackinac Race last weekend and then, instead of heading home, turned west and headed down Lake Michigan to the Chicago race.

E“We just love Chicago,” said Ed Vermet of Grosse Pointe Farms, as he took his J-120 Nauti Boys from Mackinac Island down to the Chicago race. “It’s more of a drag race because you usually are able to see your competition the whole way, as opposed to BYC where everyone splits up.”

Vermet was referring to the Bayview Mackinac race’s two courses, the Quantum Cove Island Course for larger, faster boats, which is where Vermet’s J-120 raced last weekend, and the Acura Shore Course, where the majority of the boats raced.

The Chicago race just has one course, up Lake Michigan to the island. But that doesn’t mean the boats will just sail along the Michigan shore. Where the boats sail depends on the wind. A boat may sail farther west into the lake if there’s more wind out there.

The Chicago race is the oldest freshwater race in the world, outdating the Bayview race by 16 years. The first Chicago race had only five boats and was won by Vanenna in 51 hour

The record for the race was set by Walt Disney’s Pyewacket in 2002, in 23 hours and 30 minutes.

The majority of the boats dock in Port Huron’s Black River before the Bayview race, providing a charming parade of boats down the river as they head out to the race course. Boats tend to come from many areas along Lake Michigan for the Chicago race.

But they are encouraged to parade before the crowds gathered on Chicago’s Navy Pier starting around 10 a.m. before the race, to give spectators a look at the fleet.

It’s another great week of Great Lakes racing