Ron

Since the boats were flying a lot, you would take a quick look at the compass when you could, and then line the bow of the boat up with a specific cloud on the horizon.

You could keep aiming at that cloud for at least 15 minutes and then you would check the compass and start the process all over again.

If you were in the Bahamas, you would look for the island first, (say Bimini) then the section of the island (north or south part) and finally as you closed, you would try to find the checkpoint boat.

Doc Magoon cured everyone of the false belief that you could follow the leader. He noticed that he could turn a few degrees off the correct course and everyone would follow him. So he kept doing it the further out in the ocean he got.....everyone followed. Next, he stopped and opened the hatches quick, as the other boats came up, he motioned that the engines were broken.

All the boats shot past him, following the wrong course....after they were gone, he put the hatches down and went back on the right heading and won the race.

Ah, so thats how they did it.

But was the turn boat flying a small blimp or did you just find it on your own?

If you guys need Balloons, Blimps and flashing lights you should find another Hobby or a good Eye Dr. Setting a GPS or reading a compass is not all that hard.

Having been in the Navigator's seat in the past, I'd say the "parade" lap was always helpful. My concern with a flying blimp/balloon (aircraft aside) would be the tether rope finding it's way onto the course fouling props. Good thread, though, and applause to Typhoon for his honesty. Jason

I recall using a compass and stopwatch to know when to look for a turn bouy. That was before GPS!

Most of the turn boats were sportsfisherman.....they would fly large orange flags from their outriggers....when you started coming closer you would also look for a group of spectator boats that would hang around the turn boats.

Sometimes the spectator boats were bigger than the turn boats and would hide them until you were right there.

Bimini race out of Miami....down to Fowey light then back to Miami then out to Bimini....big yachts hid the turn boat at Government Cut.... and we all went past and had to come back around again.

Stopwatches were used every race. One for total time, and one for elapsed time between checkpoints. If you went too long, you knew you missed it, so you would run 90 degree sweeps of a minute each, looking for the checkpoint......Point Pleasant was very hazy a lot of times and this was common.

I remember getting a chart at the drivers meeting and having to use dividers and a compass rose to get the course headings. Then we taped it in front of the driver. We estimated time at 60mph from pin to pin and adjusted from there once we got going. Isn't that how your supposed to do it even today?

OPA has turn boats with bright orange flags, but I bet this thread started because of a hazy race in Ortley NJ last year where turn 3 was hard to find. Plus we put turn 3 about a 1/2 mile off the beach rather than a 1/4 mile out so it wasn't simply going up and down the beach, they needed to find it. Plus the fleet of spectators was right beyond the turn, so the turn boat blended in.

Plus now with canopies and lower visibility it's harder to see the turns from a distance.

I can see the reason to make turns easier to find and I can see why they should be harder to find, so how about this. If someone will provide bigger brighter turn boat flags or some sort of streamers, I'll get the turn boats to fly them cause I was only kidding about lighting them on fire.

Fair enough?

I still say get rid of the GPS and Chart Plotters!

That takes away one big factor in winning a race! Navigation.

I disagree that haze was the true issue for so many missing the North East turn.

The challenge of the course itself I think threw everyone a curve.

It didn't seem many took the time to set the coordinates for the legs and followed their compasses.

They came out of turn 2 and lined themselves up for the Coast Guard boat which was in the center of the course. From there you look further north and it was right inline with turn 4 the north west turn of the course.
Some caught it in time and made a hard right turn in order to not miss turn 3. Others made it to turn 4 to only back track to turn 3 and make up the pin.
The times I have showed who made up the turn.
Example:
Warpaint & Jem pass @ 12:35:26PM
Wazzup2 makes hard right and makes the turn correctly @12:37:12PM
JEM comes back to make up turn @ 12:37:28PM
Warpaint passes at 12:40:00PM after completing lap
Smitty & JEM pass at the same time @ 12:41:40PM with an avg loss of 1 min 40 for JEM to make up turn 2.
Officials made the right call in this case, and JEM won the race.
Once people knew the layout of the course, no one missed that turn again... If it was too hazy, they probably would have missed it at least one more time....

Get back to the basics!

Use land marks if you can, know how fast you are going so you have an idea how long it will take you to get from point A to Point B. Account for the distance the waves will push you and the direction in which it is pushing.

Put navigation back into offshore...

Now these were the days!