Stuart Dahlgren is the son of a sailor, started sailing at eight, owns a sailmaking business and still looks forward to the Swiftsure race every spring.
“It’s kind of something where I almost begrudgingly look forward to it,” Dahlgren said. “It’s like: ‘Aw man, Swiftsure again, it was so brutal last time.’ ”
“But in the end I always want to do it,” said the 28-year-old Sidney man. “The motto of the race is: ‘Always a challenge,’ and that’s a pretty accurate description.”
“A lot of times there is not much wind and a lot of times there is a lot of wind and a lot of tide and the competition is always high,” Dahlgren said.
The son of a Canadian Coast Guard captain, Dahlgren and his wife, Joy, another lifetime sailor, are owners of UK Sailmakers in Sidney and even live over the business. They own two sailboats, one of which, a 68-foot Santa Cruz yacht, will take the Dahlgrens and crew in the Swiftsure Lightship Classic, May 28 through 30.
Sailing “is a huge part and passion of our life,” Dahlgren said in an interview at his sailmaking loft, office and home.
“It’s what we do, it’s what we do for work, it’s what we do for fun,” he said. “That boundary between client, friend and competitor gets really blurred.”
When he and Joy take off in Westerly (accompanied by a crew of 12 to 18, depending on conditions), they will be one of what organizers believe will be a list of more than 200 entries.
It’s a testament to an event, the Swiftsure International Yacht Race, and a sport, sailboat racing, that has been changing in ways that have allowed more people to become involved in recent years and stay interested.
Swiftsure began in 1930. Since then it has been halted only by major world calamities, the Great Depression of the 1930s and the Second World War. So this year will be the 73rd running of Swiftsure.
Its most prestigious event, the Swiftsure Lightship Classic, is 138.2 nautical miles (256 kilometres) from Clover Point out to the Swiftsure Banks near the entrance of Juan de Fuca Strait. It’s also one sailors such as Dahlgren rank as one of the tops in the world.
It’s named for the former lightship, a floating lighthouse, the U.S. Coast Guard once anchored at the entrance of the strait as a navigation aid.
Racers like Dahlgren rank the Swiftsure Lightship Classic as one of the most important races on western North America. In B.C., the others would be the Southern Straits, the Victoria-Maui Race and the Vancouver Island 360.
The Swiftsure Lightship Classic offers some of the best, worst and trickiest conditions all in one race in one fairly wide stretch of ocean, all to be undertaken in two full days.
Dahlgren explained the Juan de Fuca Strait is bordered by the Olympic Mountains to the south and Vancouver Island to the north. And these land formations create a geographic funnel to channel wind and squeeze the air mass into a tighter space. So the wind coming in from the Pacific will speed up as it moves farther into the strait.
This speeding wind makes for an especially tricky turn, often in the dark, as returning boats swing past a narrow neck near Race Rocks, off Metchosin, to head north into the finish in Victoria Harbour.
“You’ll see guys on the dock at the end, eyes wide and all jazzed up and they are usually talking about Race Rocks,” Dahlgren said.
But the Swiftsure event also offers racers choices of other starts and courses. There’s the 101.9-nautical-mile Cape Flattery Race, the Juan de Fuca Race at 78.7 nautical miles, and added last year was the Hein Bank Race, 118.1 nautical miles.
There is even the Swiftsure Inshore Classic, a short trip designed to get sailors into Cadboro Bay in time for supper.
Also added this year will be a special course and start time for the faster, multi-hull catamarans and trimarans to run the Lightship Classic. This constant attention to detail and switching up the races explains why Swiftsure is undergoing a bit of a renaissance.
Charlotte Gann, Swiftsure spokeswoman, sailor and member of a family that has had an entrant in Swiftsure every year since it began, agreed.
Gann said sailors vary in their competitive levels, their skills and their boats. To make sure everybody can have a good race, it’s important to offer courses to suit. It also helps keep the event fresh, giving entrants a chance to switch from year to year.
She said the race had a high point for entrants in 1981 when it reached 441 boats, but steadily declined afterwards. A low point was reached in 2011 when 152 boats entered.
But those numbers are rebounding, with 199 last year, and Gann said registration is on track to top 200 this year.
She also credits what she calls a modern “culture of safety” bred by Swiftsure chairman Vern Burkhardt since he took over in 2012.
People now feel confident when they enter. They can push hard on themselves and their craft, but the best safety and rescue measures are built in.
“A cornerstone of Swiftsure is our safety culture,” Gann said. “It’s very high.”
Agencies including the Canadian Coast Guard, the U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Homeland Security, the Royal Canadian Air Force and the Royal Canadian Navy will be standing by for the race.
HMCS Whitehorse will fire the starting guns for the various races. It will then motor off to take a position on Swiftsure Bank standing in for the original lightship.
Gann and Dahlgren both credit an improvement in the technology of sailing gear for attracting newcomers. New materials in everything from survival suits to sails to lines and masts make modern boats faster, safer and easier to handle.
New technology has also allowed boats to get bigger, so they can carry more sail. But that also means they require bigger crews, offering more opportunities for more people to get involved.
Dahlgren believes there has never been more opportunity to get involved with sailing. Newcomers might not be able to afford or willing to buy a large racing yacht. But skippers are regularly looking for good crew members. And big racing yachts regularly carry crews of about 20.
“Sailing and racing too often gets made out to be something really elitist,” said Dahlgren. “But it’s become a bit of a misnomer to say it’s really expensive.”
“It can be high-cost entry, to own a boat and race it,” he said. “But it’s really easy to become involved as a member of a crew.”
“All you need are good rubber boots and a life-jacket,” Dahlgren said.
