Potomac Cup Article by Tanya Topolewski

do not know Doc Gilbert. Never met the man, but I know of him now through
the legacy of his boat, his crew, and a set of experiences in the 2003 Potomac
Cup that he surely must have had a hand in.
I am new to the Washington Sailing Club. However, after two trips on a
Lightning, I told Joe Warren ‘sign me up for both days of the Potomac Cup
with a skipper who will sail when it’s screaming wind’ and I got the honor
of sailing on the Lord Jim with Chandler Owen at the helm.
On race day, I introduced myself to Chandler while he was rummaging in his van
which runneth over with sailing gear. He promptly handed a file to scrape
some lumps off the bottom fin of the boat and my crew mate, Emily, was busy
electrical taping every shroud shackle in sight. Chandler was checking line
settings, wondering about unfamiliar rigging set ups, randomly musing about
the condition of equipment, and generally attacking the Lord Jim’s boat
rigging with a vengeance. His mantra: every little item makes a difference in
sailing. He was on an unrelenting quest to improve the boats sailing
performance.
However, the trailer was lagging in the performance department. On the thirty
mile drive to the regatta, the old trailer had nearly given up the ghost and
was nearly bending in half at some rusted out locations. Chandler finished
the trailer off with his fly weight while rigging the boat, and it went
‘thud’ as the stern bottom hit the asphalt. This caused Chandler to
scratch is head. Then he rummaged in the van and appeared with an old
spinnaker pole, a random galvanized object and duct tape. Sister the poles to
the trailer, tape it up and -voila! Trailer good as new.
When the Lord Jim ready to sail, Chandler was not in the mood to wait for a
hoist. I knew I was in trouble when we were at the launch ramp and he handed
me the bow line and said ‘Run!’. I looked back as he was shoving the
trailer down the boat ramp at top speed. Emily ducked as I ran past her with
the bow line and in two seconds flat, the trailer crashes into the water and
the Lord Jim does a splash down, floats free and agreeably spins her bow
toward the end of the dock. Our 5 second flying boat launch was impressive to
all around. Emily and I just stood on the dock with ‘yes, we meant to do
that’ poses.
After sailing out to the worlds longest start line, the race begins and we are
on our first beat. BOOM! our main drops like a limp rag. Most other boats
have vague memories of some idiot climbing a mast to the spreaders…yes, that
was the Lord Jim. After this quick diagnosis shimmy, and the realization that
having the skipper up the mast was most likely to cause a serious Chandler
smack down, he proposed the next best thing…we would lay the Lightning on
its side and he would be in the water to retie a line to the main. Yes, folks,
we were hell bent on intentionally capsizing our boat in the middle of the
race.
Emily and I were all for this. Sure, we can just roll Lord Jim over, and then
climb to the centerboard…we wouldn’t even get wet! No problem! For those
of you who have never intentionally tried to capsize a Lightning, let me tell
you…it’s hard to do. Emily and I had to nearly hang off the port side to
induce a roll, and with the Lightings wide beam we swimming before you could
say ‘bad idea!’. With Emily and I flailing, the Lord Jim proceeded to
turtle until the mast got stuck in the mud. This is not part of our brilliant
plan, and when we couldn’t quite manage tying a new line to the main, we
righted the boat.
Funny, the race committee didn’t immediately send a crash boat out to the
lunatics who capsized their own boat. They eventually did and we got a tow to
the dock. Bailing like mad, our bucket rebelled and shredded itself into a
nearly unfunctional bucket-like object with dagger sharp edges. We found much
of it floating back by the transom as we got to the dock as we could not bail
the boat to any more with it.
Next plan: we’ll turn the boat on it’s side on the trailer for the
repair. Remember the high quality trailer we were dealing with? We didn’t.
We rebroke the braced the trailer as we bent the support poles to the ground
trying to get our unbailed boat out of the water. We ‘liberated’ someone
elses trailer a proceeded with the repair. We tried hard to clean the mast
and sails. It turns out Chandler had ‘borrowed’ these pretty darn new,
white, crisp sails without really letting the owner know…really, they look
better with a little mud. We changed our clothes and let me tell you, there
is no better sailing bonding moment than seeing your skipper in his boxers.
We relaunch the boat and as the wind catches the Lord Jim and swungs it
around, Emily and I watch dumbfounded as the bow line knot slips away as if it
had never been tied. There went the Lord Jim floating free and heading right
for a brand new speedboat in the other launch. As I am shouting
‘NOOOOOOOOO!’ with my empty bow line waving in the breeze, I have still
have a vision of Emily’s feet as she completes her head first dive into the
water to catch the runaway Lord Jim….
So that was our first race on the Lord Jim in the 2003 Potomac Cup. As we
told this story other sailors shared many other Doc Gilbert tales. I think
this story is a continuation of his life as a never-say-die sailor who
thoroughly and enthusiastically solved problems in any manner that was (and
perhaps wasn’t) appropriate. Sometimes these solutions worked, sometimes
they didn’t, but working or not wasn’t the point, doing and trying was the
point, the lesson, and the fun of sailing. Like I said, I never met the Doc
Gilbert, but I think I sailed with him throwing curveballs at myself, Chandler
and Emily, and I am all the richer for having learned a small part of his
lessons.
Doc Gilbert Potomac Cup
May 3-4
31 Boats, 3 Races

Place

Sail #

Skipper

Crew

Fleet

Race 1

Race 2

Race 3

Total

1

14855

Dick Hallagan

Lori Foster / Alister Thomson

Fleet 77

2

1

1

4

2

14942

Dick Moyer

Helen Moyer / Doug Pierce

Riverton

4

2

2

8

3

14941

Pierce Barden

Josh Crosby / Doug Sherwood

Fleet 511

3

5

8

16

4

15101

Todd Johnson

Cathy Bleakly / Katie Offerman

Fleet 329

5

9

6

20

5

14277

Eric Beck

Matt Beck / Gary Schneiderman

Fleet 75

13

3

5

21

6

14217

Drew Hudson

Sousan Arefeh / Tony Vernon

Fleet 50

1

10

11

22

7

14096

Nabeel Alsalam

Russ Roberts / Scott Bradford

Fleet 50

6

12

4

22

8

14485

Ron Buchanan

 

Fleet 509

11

7

7

25

9

14968

Byrne O'Brien

Karen O'Brien / Ed Seyerlein

Fleet 484

12

6

9

27

10

14395

Jeff Storck

Craig Huzway / Cathy Feig

Fleet 50

10

16

3

29

11

14902

Carol Park

Bill Remorenko / Mike Guion

Fleet 253

14

4

17

35

12

14566

Frank Gallagher

Lolita Hart / Skip Hirsch

Fleet 50

7

18

10

35

13

14932

John Pelosi

Harold Broadwell / Gene Prather

Fleet 481

8

11

16

35

14

15101X

Pat McGee

Paul Maher / Ian MacLeod

Fleet 50

9

20

14

43

15

7603

Bob Astrove

Scott Graham / Elizabeth Morris

Fleet 50

23

15

13

51

16

14627

Nelson Pemberton

Christy Dillard / Craig Finster

Fleet 50

16

13

23

52

17

15118

Star Mikell

Joe Deerin / Justin Morris

Fleet 253

24

17

12

53

18

15141

Avis Bridgers

Henry Bridgers / Dan Slone

Fleet 481

20

19

15

54

19

11767

Harry Keith

Henry Keith / Donna Cohen

Fleet 50

15

21

21

57

20

14449

Chandler Owen

Emily Tant / Tanya Topolewski

Fleet 50

32/DNF

8

18

58

21

14363

Larry Decker

Jan Crittenden / Mark Keane

Fleet 75

19

22

20

61

22

14527

Rick Welch

Jennifer Parrow / James Easter

Fleet 50

20

14

28

64

23

14266

Dave Pyle

Carolyn Pyle / Dave Chiquiqnic

Fleet 511

21

24

19

64

24

14592

Ben Good

Jill Williamson / Hayden Smith

Fleet 50

18

23

25

66

25

14156

Red Ferhle

Amy Wiggins /

Fleet 50

27

26

24

77

26

14521

Joe Anderson

Dan Parietti /

Fleet 50

25

27

26

78

27

14555

Joe Warren

John Hart /

Fleet 50

26

25

27

78

28

10745

David Thompson

Barbara Thompson / Susan Nickbarg

Fleet 50

29

29

22

80

29

14525

John Bates

Matt Potbin / Jim Smekle

Fleet 253

17

32/DNF

32/DNF

81

30

13306

Laurie Duncan

Kris Swanson / Maryann Gallagher

Fleet 50

28

28

29

85

31

10643

Ted Okada

Neil Eggleston / Margaret Zeigler

Fleet 50

30

32/DNF

32/DNF

94

 

 

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