Aw gee Brett....There ya' went and just crapped all over my 505!!! (:<))

I do tend to agree, but such is the world. I also agree that the midwest ain't a bad place for sailing. Much of the Great Lakes is just like Ocean sailing, but those little midwest 4 or 5 thousand acre lakes with inlets, hills, trees........They will teach you more about reading wind and water than any ocean sailing. Case in point:

My brother-in-law is an Annapolis grad and an aerospace engineer with Lockheed and has a lot of big boat and ocean experience. When they came up here in '87 we all went sailing on a Thistle I had at the time. I let Bob sail as I knew he was competent and all of course, but I also waited for the experience I knew was coming. Buckeye Lake has incredible wind shifts, lots of wind shadows, and is about as tough to sail well on as any place I have ever been. I was trimming and Bob could not get over what was going on and how attentive he had to be. I then started pointing out the holes in the wind and calling tacks for him and he was just completely amazed. As we came through a bend in the lake we not only had to turn slightly, but caught a lift which took us from a hard beat to a broad reach in just a few seconds and had we been sailing something less stable than the Thistle, we'd have broached. I popped the chute after he'd recovered and then ask he if wanted to trade places for awhile. It was a smallish kite and I knew I could carry it up to a beam reach and after a few minutes the wind shifted again and I came up, put the girls on the rail and watched as he had one helluva' time trimming, but we came up on plane and she was flying. He still talks about that day. Before that day I think he had no respect for us little lake dinghy sailors. Gave me great joy to convert another one!!!

And along with the naval officers, remember that Bill Koch, a Kansan who won the Cup, went to the King of lake racing to help him do it....Buddy Melges from Wisconsin.

Spaw