All J-120 Owners,
RE: J-120 NOR's and Logistics

I only caught up with about half of the Fleet at the Aldo awards ceremony, so I'm following-up with all to be sure everybody is properly notified and officially invited to the 2009 J-120 South Beach Invitational. Beyond the Regatta itself, it is also officially the unofficial Fleet Party so I was glad to hear of everybody's interest to participate! In trying to address some of the logistical concerns that hosting any event at this site presents, I assembled some 'pre-Regatta info packets' that some of you already have. For those who don't, please email me your home address ASAP so that I can put them in the US Mail for you. Each packet (envelope) contains:

 - Copies of the NOR
 - (3) Magnetic gate key passes
 - (12) Orange "beverage bracelets"
 - Maps and parking options for South Beach Harbor

Please note that the magnetic card gate keys are separate from vehicle parking passes. The gate keys are on loan for the weekend as a favor from the South Beach Yacht Club Commodore and Harbormaster. The magnetic cards get you in and out of the rest rooms, dock gates and will raise the gate arm to get a car into the SBC Ballpark lot - but they are not valid as parking passes. As these keys are valuable and may have a tendency get 'lost' in gear bags, please note that although they were lent to us for free, each key is coded and a $50 deposit has been placed for EACH key. Please then be sure to return all three (3) card keys to me after the awards ceremony on Sunday evening or you (and I) will be charged $50 per missing key.

An allotment of vehicle parking passes has also been made available to us ahead of time. However, parking passes are for sale as an ala carte item for $10 each (per vehicle). Each boat can order up to six (6) parking passes, which are valid for the covered parking inside Pier 40 or for the SBC Park/Yacht Club lot for the Saturday AND Sunday of the Regatta. There's no Giants game that weekend, but there is an AVP Volleyball Tournament on Pier 32 so street parking may be a challenge and I would recommend buying at least a couple parking passes at what works out to be just $5 per day. For those of you who don't already have packets or for others who may want more parking passes, please email me and I'll send them out ASAP. The idea is if you have them (and gate keys) in hand before you arrive, that you or your crew won't have to deal with parking issues, dock access or the grumpy government Harbormaster all weekend.

If you are part of the half who does not berth at South Beach (welcome, Barry!), your mooring fee's are taken care of for Saturday and/or Saturday night. If you would like to come early on Friday or stay later than Sunday afternoon, you will need to contact the Harbormaster directly and make those arrangements yourself. Otherwise, you have already been registered and the guest docking assignment for Saturday is as follows:

Slip A74: Desdemona
Slip A76: Grace Dances
Slip A78: Deyanu
Slip A80: Late Harvest (also staying Friday night). Note to Jim F.: You have already been registered for Friday night too - which will simply be added to your Regatta invoice and/or entry fee.

(More RSVP chores, and if you are one of these boats, please email me your Boat Registration number for the South Beach Harbormasters registration.)

Beyond that and to the fun stuff, the orange beverage bracelets are for access to a keg of beer the SBYC will have waiting for us after racing on Saturday. They Yacht Club will of course be open to their members too, but our 'free' beer will not and bracelets will also identify us as guests. There will also be a catered dinner prepared for us on Saturday night. As this is the unofficial/official Fleet dinner party, please then be sure to encourage your spouses, guests, guests of your crew and friends of the Fleet to join us on Saturday afternoon. The dinner is not hosted, yet because it is catered and catering demands a pre-paid minimum, each boat will be liable for individual purchase of at least seven (7) dinner tickets at $12 each. Like the magnetic gate keys, you will be responsible for any tickets unsold to your boat under that allotment so be sure all your crew and their guests identify themselves when buying dinner tickets. All tickets will be sold at the door - and I promise you the meal will be good and beyond the scope of Yacht Club burgers. That said, there's nothing wrong with Yacht Club burgers and such will be the faire for Sunday afternoon for $10 per. Again, the Sunday BBQ will also be non-hosted and tickets will be available at the door - with no minimum purchase required from any boat.

The entry fee, any unsold dinners, extra moorage or any lost gate keys will be added up at the end of the Regatta and you will be billed accordingly through the Fleet.

The racing itself is always fun off of South Beach where the water is flat and the sun actually does comes out. The SI's will be posted on the SBYC website later next week, or you can get a hard copy at the Yacht Club on Saturday morning. We have procured a second RIB/mark boat this year to help splash buoys and keep courses square, with three shorter races scheduled on Saturday and two on Sunday. So that we can all work on boat handling and in preparation for BBS, the windward/leeward courses will be a tad shorter than we're typically used to - so be ready to play nice and have fun in the South Beach sun.

Hope this answers any questions you may have about the upcoming Regatta and that you are looking forward to it. If you have any questions beyond the scope of this memo, please feel free to contact me as my interest in helping organize this Regatta is simply to make it run smoothly in hopes that it will eventually become one of the premiere events on our schedule. Otherwise, thanks for getting back to me by Wednesday morning (August 5th) with:

1. Your home mailing address
2. Boat Registration number (for guest mooring)
3. Requests for additional parking passes

Thanks again and tight lines -

T.

Thomas C. Allard