Local team competes in New York Yacht Cub invitational

By Peggy Walsh-Sarnecki

September 3, 2014 at 8:07 pm New York

Paul Hulsey, Todd Jones, Sarah Somes and Alex Hume, left, are representing Bayview Yacht Club in the New York Yacht Club’s invitational qualifying regatta.

A team of local sailors is competing among the top teams in the U.S. this week in the New York Yacht Club Invitational Regatta, the qualifier to the New York Yacht Club Invitational Cup.

That’s right, you need an invitation to even try to qualify for the invitational.

The New York Yacht Club sent out notices to all the U.S. yacht clubs inviting them to submit resumes of the team they would send.

Bayview Yacht Club in Detroit submitted the team of Paul Hulsey as skipper, Todd Jones as tactician, and Sarah Somes and Alex Hume as crew, and the BYC team was one of the 22 selected to compete in the qualifying regatta.

“I’m very honored to be picked by my yacht club, we have a lots of good sailors,” Hulsey said.

This is a Corinthian, or amateur regatta, but the 22 teams are all very talented. The BYC team is loaded with experience. Hulsey has a long list of championships and has over 25,000 miles in long distance racing and 27 Bell’s Beer Bayview Mackinac Races and two Newport to Bermuda races.

Jones has been racing for 34 years and has done 50 Chicago and Port Huron Mackinac races. Somes and Hume also have long resumes including sailing in national and North American championships.

The 22-boat fleet is divided into two divisions, racing each other over four days in J-70s and Sonars. After two days, the top six boats in each division will compete over the final two days.

The top three boats after all four days will be invited to the 2015 invitational, and compete against not only the top U.S. teams but 20 or so top international teams.

After Wednesday’s sailing the BYC team was in second place in their division. But Hulsey said there’s a lot of sailing to do yet. He gives them an even chance to qualify.

“The reality is all the teams are very good and tomorrow’s another day,” Hulsey said.