The Maui Channel Relay Report by Bill Ireland (9/1/01)

Editor's Note: Thanks Bill for a great report!

Saturday, September 1, 2001 had a deceiving beauty as the boats for 50 some teams, including 8 soloists, headed out into the channel for a 3 hour tour, a 3 hour tour. Oops, I mean the 30th anniversary Lanai to Maui challenge. Ian Emberson again ran a wonderful spirited hospitable competition, an awards banquet, and swam in the competition -- hint, hint. After several days of high winds, the air was still, the sea was calm and the sky clear. That would change. Four teams made the trip from SCAQ, together with Marianna, Lynn Canning, Carmela and other former, present and future SCAQ stalwarts. Robert and Cat had tried the solo earlier in the week but had decided not to overdo after 90 minutes of heavy swells. The foreign teams included 1 Japanese team, 4 Australian teams (back after a one-year Sydney Olympic caused hiatus), and 6 from the Lone Star Republic of Texas.

The accessorization competition among the SCAQ teams was as fierce as the racing. Technical difficulties prevent visual documentation. Pod Sally's team had team t-shirts with the world renowned 1/2 baked clam logo (aka The Half-Baked Clams), the Blue Buzz had a team banner, team suits, team towels, matching nail polish (with some holdouts), camaraderie, and funky necklaces for the dinner. Rayko (fka Reiko) and the Cabinboys had matching team suits in an attractive blue floral print (supplied by Dawn Heckman's fledgling company. Operaters are standing by to take orders), and matching Hawaiian shirts for the awards banquet. No winner was declared in the accessorization competition, although the Cabinboys claimed the Sportsmanship award for resisting the temptation to watch their competition be eliminated from the race by a completely inattentive Olympic Club catamaran. First Peter Egan, leading off (without team nail polish) for the Blue Buzz, and then Marc Willick, leading off for the 1/2 Bakeds, were about to be run over by an Olympic Club catamaran with a captain who couldn't see the water in front of his hulls from his post, and a team who couldn't be bothered to post lookouts to protect the other swimmers from their boat. The Cabinboys yelled across the water and with difficulty alerted the catamaran who reluctantly changed course -- three separate times -- until the Oympic Club boat captain decided to look for other swimmers in the water.

After 20 minutes into the race, three SCAQ teams were all closely clustered and wondering why, other than the natural beauty and warm water, they had all travelled to Hawaii for a competition when they could have just done a relay from Hermosa to Manhattan and saved a lot of money. Of course, trash talk cell phone calls were attempted from boat to boat. The teams veered off and chose different courses as the race continued. And then the foreshadowing above was fulfilled as the beauty remained but the conditions changed. The 4th swimmers for each team entered the water to the crystalline deep blue beauty of the Maui channel, and exited wondering how they hadn't noticed the 4 to 5 foot swells beforehand. The answer was the wind and swells picked up, and it was a very different swim. The swells reached 5 feet, tossing swimmers off course, and for Bill Belding, of the Cabinboys, knocking him into a spin onto his back at one peak. The challenging conditions continued throughout the race, and reading the current became doubly important as the teams hoped to find the correct line to the finish to shorten the race, and find calmer water. 2 1/2 hours into the race, the 3 SCAQ teams appeared closely paced (but who really knows when you're on the boat trying to figure it out), and the Blue Buzz and 1/2 Bakeds crossed paths, with their cheering redoubled for their team-mates. The Blue Buzz had Peter Egan, Jenny Cook, Bram Tester, Chappy DeHaven (a channel swim rookie), Jeni Buys, and Kathy Mann. The 1/2 Bakeds were Marc Willick, Ryan Hunter, Scott Hubbell, Pam Lazzetto, Laura Tanabe, and Cindy Miller ( a channel rookie and location scout for Rose Bowl Aquatics). Reyko and the Cabinboys had Chris Yontes, Parks Wesson, Bill Ireland (although he almost went unmentioned at the Awards Banquet), Pat Dixon (not a channel swim rookie), Bill Belding, and Mac Montgomery. The fourth SCAQ team was The Winsome Wave Wallowers and consisted of Cat, Robert, J. Frank Stewart from UCLA, and three swimmers from the La Jolla Swim Club: Carol Hamilton (who won her age group at the Wakiki Rough Water Swim), Rene Murphy and Ida Jones. (Editor's Note: Apologies for getting the details wrong about this team previously).

By the finish, the 1/2 Bakeds had pulled ahead of the Blue Buzz by only 30 seconds on their 4th swimmer's second leg, finishing 9th and 10th overall among the relays. The Cabinboys finished 12th among the relays, barely 20 seconds ahead of a Stanford team--which turned out to be important. The Winsome Wave Wallowers finished in 5:05, with Cat swimming into the finish. The final team, consisting entirely of service personnel, finished 8 hours after starting -- which was better than the year one team finished during the awards banquet. The importance was revealed at the Awards Banquet where Ian's daughters who Pat Dixon remembered from his early years of competition as toddlers playing behind the microphone, assisted Ian in handing out the awards. Contrary to rumors that all competitors would be receiving pilsner glasses, the awards remained the coveted towels, in red this year. The overall winner was Bobby Paycheck (as Bob Placak was christened by the 2nd place Aussies), in his 16th consecutive year of competition with his self-sponsored and promotionally named RCP One-Mile Tiburon tam, with the Flanagan brothers from Honolulu -- John was last year's Wakiki Roughwater champion, Ryk Neething from the South African Olympic team, Amanda Beard (2-time US Olympian and the first woman to have her name engraved on the Championship Trophy), and another swimmer from the US Open Water team. The overall woman's champion team included Maureen O'Toole from the US Silver medal winning Women's Water Polo team. The oldest Makule champion team included Bobby Patten, and his father, Bob Patten, who purported disinherited his son after being talked into the swim by being told that it was just like swimming in a crowded lane at a pool practice only to be subjected to the aforementioned 5 foot swells, former Olympian Jim Montgomery, and Graham Johnson -- who warmed up for the race by setting a 10K pool swim world record at the Lahiana pool for the 70-74 age group on Friday and broke the 5K record en route. Ian announced that he would tweak the categories next year and add an older category for the Mixed Division presumably in response to the growth of the MIxed Division, which was the largest category in the race.

The 1/2 Bakeds were the 3rd place team in this year's Mixed Division, followed by the Blue Buzz, who finished 4th, and received award towels. The Cabinboys were the champions of the 270+ Makule division after beating the second place team by only 20 seconds, and posed for photographs afterwards, in pineapple splendor, holding the Perpetual Award Trophy, which will travel like the Stanley Cup, engraved with all the member's names, but without the Security Guard, from team member to team member (Reiko and Parks have to share), until next year when it will return to Maui for the 31st edition of the world's most challenging and most fun Master's relay race.