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Everyone is ready for the big race tomorrow. Thank you Ed Watson for the photo of Victoria Inner Harbor 5/23/2025.

The Swiftsure International Yacht Race is the premier long distance sailing race in the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia area. Starting and ending in Victoria, BC, Canada, the Swiftsure is international because the midpoint markers for the four long courses are in U.S. waters. Organized by the Royal Victoria Yacht Club, the race occurs during the Memorial Day weekend in May with staggered starts on Saturday morning. The race is most popular with sailors from British Columbia and Washington, but it has drawn boats from as far away as California, Hawaii, New Zealand, and even Russia.


Bruce’s Weather Forecast

CHEK TV Livestream

Swiftsure Recap

We will be posting live updates here

Saturday

0800: No speed records are at risk of falling at the moment. Very light conditions. Boats on the way out to the start. Each time the model refreshes the westerly gets pushed later. Right now Discovery Island and Race Rocks both reporting NE under 5.

0830: 30 mins to go and already 36 people waiting for the livestream.

0905: Big boats got off on time, but took a while to clear the line, so the Cape Flattery race has been postponed. Still very light NE breeze.

0925: Cape Flattery away, still super light, but current on the ebb is helping.

Predict Current screenshot of Race Rocks for 0924 (the arrows are going down and to the left, pushing the boats down the course).

1000: Congratulations to CHEK tv, Ed Watson and the entire Swiftsure media team for great live coverage of the start. All boats are away. ‘Mach 2’ leads the Lightship Classic fleet and ‘Smoke’ leads the Cape Flattery fleet about half way to Race Rocks.

1100: Scatteraction heading right into Race Passage, Smoke on the inside, Mist on the outside. SOGs falling fast.

1200: Thank you to Kurt Watkins on ‘Maelstrom’ with Dan Kaseler, Mats Elf, Ross Jesperson, Michael Karas and Nils Watkins, for these great photos from the Cape Flattery course. ‘Smoke’ out to a big lead, clear of Race Passage, ‘Glory’, ‘Mist’, ‘Mach 2’, and ‘Scatteraction’ all right in the passage - everyone going very slow - sometimes less than 1 knot over the ground. The flood must be full tilt by now.

1315: Thank you Julia Mamen on ‘Terramoto’ for these pictures in Race Passage near George Point. Team ‘Terramoto’ with Bill Weinstein, Alyosha Strum-Palerm, Stasi Burzycki, Herb Cole, Tim Scanlon, Adam Gibbs, and Julia Mamen were the first to recognize that there is something slower than being stopped…. and anchored.

1400: Thank you ‘Glory’ for sending in this video of the boats all parked up waiting for the westerly. 13 crew on a TP 52, that is a lot to manage! John Buchan, Spencer Kunath, Bob Pistay, Mark Laura, Matt Pistay, Chris Roberts, Bob King, Sam Bush, Chris Burd, Kris Thompson, Winston Degraw, and Frankie Roberts are on ‘Glory’ this year. Who was in charge of the water balloons?

From Terramoto, Sat, 1430

1430: Another great photo from Julia Mamen on ‘Terramoto’, the restart is underway. Might there be both an ebb AND a westerly soon?

1600: Sounds like ‘Glory’ and ‘Smoke’ have retired. According to the tracker, ‘Terramoto’ is leading the Cape Flattery race with ‘Blue’, ‘Rosebud’, ‘Tachyon’, and ‘Joy Ride’ all right there — within a mile. They are making 7 knots over the ground. The westerly is supposed to fade, so fingers crossed that happens late. In the Classic, ‘Mach 2’ has jumped out and is making 9 knots.

1710: ‘Zulu5’ is leading the boats that are trying to get over to the US side, most of the fleet is along the Canadian side, ‘Terramoto’ and ‘Rosebud’ are toying with the idea of crossing, right now not even half way across. The breeze must be holding up because ‘Mach 2’ is making over 10 knots over the ground and ‘Terramoto’ is in the 7s. The ebb will continue for a few more hours.

1820: ‘Zulu5’ still closest to the US side, now joined by ‘Joy Ride’ and ‘With Grace’ just passing the border line. ‘Blue’, ‘Terramoto’, ‘Rosebud’, and ‘Free Bowl of Soup’ in a very tight pack just before the border line on a course of 257. It looks like the great migration is on. The boats in the Classic race are all on the Canadian shore with ‘Mach 2’ out front by maybe 4 nm. The tracker is showing ‘Mach 2’ well back from the lead, not sure why that is. I don’t think Kwindoo calculates the corrected times. Everyone still making great SOG.

2000:

On the Juan de Fuca multihulls course: Nigel Oswald on his Ferrier F32SR ‘Kelona’, from NWMA, is half way back to Victoria from the rounding. Only 44 nm to go. He has a commanding lead over Kim Alfreds on ‘Cheekee Monkee’ from Royal Vancouver Yacht Club.

On the Juan de Fuca monohulls course: It is a bit hard to tell from the tracker, but Peter Dennis and his Royal Victoria Yacht Club team on the Swan 46 ‘Setri’ look to be the lead boat and have also just rounded the turning mark in Clallam Bay. The current is still on the ebb, so progress back to Victoria will be slow until the current switches to flood in a bit over an hour.

On the Classic course, ‘Mach 2’ is about 5 nm east of Port Renfrew.

These pictures just in from Julia Mamen on ‘Terramoto’. If you look closely you can see ‘Blue’ in the lead. Thank you Julia!

On the Cape Flattery course, ‘Blue’, ‘Terramoto’, ‘Rosebud’, and ‘Tachyon’ are within a mile of each other and about 10 miles from the turning mark. They also may round before the current turns to flood. They are making good SOG of over 8 knots, so the breeze must be holding up.

Correction: Blaine Pedlow and his team from St Francis Yacht Club look to be leading into the turning mark on their SC 52 ‘Rosebud’.

2140: This just in from Alyosha Strum-Palerm on ‘Terramoto’ as they round the mark and head home.

Correction: I had left Alyosha off of the ‘Terramoto’ crew list earlier (sorry about that).

Sunday

0245: Several boats back in the harbor. No way of knowing which finished and which dropped out and which phones may have become disconnected from the tracker. Here is the order as I see boats going into the harbor: Listed on the Juan de Fuca course: ‘Mata Hari’, ‘Elsewhere’, ‘Cherokee’, ‘Stargazer’, and ‘Jaguar’ just approaching the finish line and ‘Katana’ after that, we have to figure ‘Setri’ was in there somewhere — likely at the front of the list given the lead they had last night.

On the Cape Flattery course: ‘Terramoto’ almost to the finish ahead of ‘Blue’, ‘Zulu5’ just through Race Rocks, followed by ‘Rosebud’ and ‘Free Bowl of Soup’.

Julia Mamen photo of Alyosha Strum-Palerm driving ‘Terramoto’ through Race Rocks on the return.

0300: Looks like ‘Terramoto’ finished first just a few minutes ago with Alyosha Strum-Palerm and Stasi Burzycki as co-skippers, Herb Cole, Tim Scanlon, Adam Gibbs, and Julia Mamen on board. Nice work! I don’t see ‘Blue’ on the tracker anymore, but I think they were second across the line, then ‘Zulu5’

12 hours to the mark and 6 hours back leads me to think the breeze was pretty good on the way back (in addition to being downwind and with the current). It will be great to hear the stories once everyone gets some sleep.

On the Classic course: Looks like ‘Mach 2’ is making about 2 knots and getting close to rounding the turning mark on Swiftsure Bank.

On Juan de Fuca Multihulls: The Swiftsure website shows: ‘Kelona’, then ‘Cheekee Monkee’, then ‘Unleaded’

We will have to sort this out when the results are posted!

There are boats strewn all of the way back to the Cape Flattery turning mark. It appears most boats have rounded the mark and are making slow progress back. So the leaders look to have escaped the west end of the strait before the wind dropped, and now with the current turning to ebb, it could be a while before the others make it back.

‘65 Red Roses II’, ‘Joy Ride’, and ‘Tachyon’ are grouped together approaching Race Rocks at over 9 knots. So the breeze looks pretty good there.

0715: Correction, Bill Weinstein was not on board ‘Terramoto’

0845: More boats finishing. If you have been following the tracker, you have experienced some of its shortcomings, including the boats registered in the wrong fleets, boats that were not counted as starting so the real time leaderboard was incorrect, and most recently, boats that have finished but the tracker is still on a crew member’s phone while walking down the street in Victoria. Despite all of this, it is better than having no tracker at all! (and we are really looking forward to getting some results from the race organizers).

‘Mach 2’ now directly north of the Cape Flattery lighthouse on the way back home. They are making over 9 knots despite the ebb, so the breeze must be improving. The 0830 report from the Neah Bay buoy is 8 knots out of the east. The stragglers from the Cape Flattery race are working hard to sail faster than the current, currently showing very little progress.

The first pro pictures are up from photographer Jill Fitz Hirshbold.

1040: The Classic course boats and the trailing Cape Flattery boats have to get through the light spot between the easterly at the Neah Bay buoy and the westerly at Sheringham Point. As soon as they do, they should have 5 - 15 out of the west for the rest of the trip home. Even better, the current is turning to flood and should last long enough. So, in a bit of a turn around from yesterday at about this time when the boats were anchoring! Right now the signs point to the possibility that all boats that want to finish will make it before the time limit at midnight tonight.

1230: Maybe a dozen boats left on the course now. Everyone looks to be making great progress towards the finish.

1630: Looks like ‘Mach 2’ is back in the harbor. The scoring system does not show them as finished, but has not reported their place accurately the entire time. Maybe 6 boats left to go.

Big smiles on ‘Mazu’ as they approach Race Rocks. Thank you Irene Tang for the photo and the update!

7.5 hours to go before the time limit at midnight. Everyone should have adequate time to finish.

Later: Evidently ‘Mach 2’ had dropped out and was motoring. Still waiting for final results, but the preliminary results on the website have been cleaned up a bit.

Source: https://www.swiftsure.org/
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