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BARKER, ISLER BEEF UP THE PYEWACKET TEAM. (April 30, 2003 Press Release from www.transpacificyc.org) LONG BEACH, Calif.---Team New Zealand skipper Dean Barker and longtime Stars & Stripes navigator Peter Isler will be new members of the Pyewacket crew when the record-holding Reichel/Pugh 77 sails its last race for Roy E. Disney in the 42nd Transpacific Yacht Race to Hawaii in July.. Disney has sold the boat to an undisclosed Asian buyer to make room for a
maxZ86---his fourth Pyewacket---currently under construction in The 2003 contest looms as a 2,225-nautical mile match race against Philippe Kahn's own R/P 77, Pegasus, the 2001 Barn Door winner. Barker will play a key role.
Roy Pat Disney, son of the owner, said, "We'll need a bunch of good drivers." And a first-rate navigator. Replacing Stan Honey, who will be sailing his own
Cal 40 in a special revival of the class, is a tall order. Honey has won eight
of the 17 races he has navigated from the West Coast to Isler said, "It's gigantic shoes to fill. They're more like snowshoes or Shaquille O'Neal's sneakers." But any doubts were dismissed after last weekend's 56th Tommy Bahama Newport
to Ensenada Yacht Race. Isler, aboard Pyewacket for his first tune-up race with
the team, called the move that brought Pyewacket from behind the powerful new
Alchemy to win the 125-nautical mile Roy Pat Disney, who took over as skipper in his father's business-related absence, said, "That boat we were racing was easily faster than us." But, Isler said, "We jibed about 32 miles from the finish line, essentially on the lay line. [Alchemy's] mistake was that they should have jibed first, because by the time they jibed we had been sailing toward the [finish line]." Isler and Honey attended Yale at the same time. Isler majored in meteorology, Honey in electrical engineering, and they taught wintertime navigation classes together at Yale Corinthian Yacht Club. Barker's reputation has not suffered despite his team's dismal 0-5 showing
against "He's a fine sailor [who] got saddled with a boat that was too thin," Roy Pat Disney said. "Because Philippe spends so bloody much money [hiring world-class crews], we felt we needed a bunch of good drivers. That's one of the edges on a long race." Two years ago Kahn won with what crew member Zan Drejes called "the best crew money can buy." Drejes is a Pyewacket alumnus who won Transpac's top crew award in successive years on the two boats. Kahn said, "I think that it's a match race with Pyewacket favored because they are Pyewacket. We'll just try to keep up with them and see if we can get lucky." |
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