The Villages 2015 Gator Regatta Report
Hedderick kicks off the 2015 season with win
By Joe Walter

Here I am, again, to fill in for Ricky Gerry who could not get his report submitted.

I hate to say it, but we finally found a way to beat Alan Perkins. Give him a heart attack right before the regatta. We are all very happy to hear that he is doing fine after his surgery and only missed the awards ceremony because his doctor was on the golf course and did not release him on time. Son-in-law, Ricky Gerry, filled in as RD with only 3 hours total sleep in a week (Blame the Wholesome Miss Madison for keeping new daddy up). It was a joy to sail with the Villages folks and a lot of new faces. Happy to see the Peachtree City Georgia group make it down to sail with us, but we missed Dave Linville.

Mother Nature gave us a little wind, but it was mostly out of the North, which means a lot of reaching at the Villages. It was challenging though, and the racing was fun. Hats off to all the skippers for a very clean regatta. Ken Morrison heard a total of ZERO protests. We saw some excellent sailing from a lot of skippers. Jeff Witzel from Jacksonville scored a bullet in A-fleet and it was an horizon job at that. I can go on about how much fun and gut-wrenching the sailing was, but I will leave something for the full report...oh wait, this is the full report.

Hats off to Dick Hedderick, who's worst race was a 6th place. He just ran away with the win. Take him out of the scores and the real battle was for 2nd place between Jon Luscomb, Bob Greer and Jack Ward. The racing was close all over and a lot of skippers had some very good races. There were two tiebreakers to sort out.

The best prize handed out at the regatta was the trophy for Bubble Boy who sailed the most heats, A and B fleets combined. That went to George Balaschak. He took home the world's smallest bottle of Champagne. BUBBLES, get it. too funny!

Great job again Villages and Alan Perkins is doing fine and I am sure will be kicking our butts again in Punta Gorda or maybe sooner in Sun City. And next time Ricky, you have to write your own report!

  Skipper Points  
1 Dick Hedderick
27
  
2 Jon Luscomb
36
3 Bob Greer
40
4 Jack Ward
41
  
5 Joe Walter
56
6 Robert Brown
67
7 Brian Engle
68
8 Martin Gray
86
  
9 Jeffrey Witzel
115
 Tie breaker
10 Jim Pardee
115
11 Chuck Ellis
117
  
12 George Balaschak
125
  
13 Don Thompson
139
  
14 Dick Reinke
145
  
15 Bud Elder
147
 Tie breaker
16 Brenda Pardee
147
17 John Goldsworthy
150
18 Ken Williams
162
  
19 Jim Merello
180
  
20 Jim Rutherford
197
21 Dan Pearce
198
22 Judy Clark
204
  
23 Larry Brannan
225
  

Sorry I do not have any photos to post right now. There were lots of photos taken, but with Alan recovering from surgery, it might be a little bit before they get up.