 Okay, we're back in the late afternoon with a really special show. Community Matters, but we're talking about the Transpac. This is the 50th anniversary of the Transpac, and the Transpac is a race. And both of our guests are heavily involved in sailboat racing and the Transpac. So at my far left, Bo Wheeler, he owns a 38-foot boat called the Maca-Oi. And he is the Staff Commodore of the Transpac Yacht Club. And then to my immediate left is Carl Geringer. He owns a 42-foot sailboat called the Maca-Oi-2. And he is the Chair of the Honolulu Committee. Of the race, correct? Of the race, of the Transpac race, again for the Transpac Yacht Club. These are very important guys because it's a very important race. And they've been dedicated to it all their lives really. And this is where the rubber meets the road. The sail meets the road, so to speak. What does the Transpac mean? Okay, what does it mean to Hawaii? What does it mean to racing? Okay, the Los Angeles to Honolulu Transpac race is a 2,225 nautical mile yacht race from off-point Furman in San Pedro. And it finishes at Diamond Head Bowie. And it's got one mark of the course, which is the west end of Catalina, which most boats get around about an hour or three or four after the start. And this race started in 1906. It was originally thought of by King David Calcao who wanted to organize a race. That had to be after the overthrow. He was still active. The race didn't come to pass during his time, but he was the one who sent the first challenge out to the mainland. He was very globally minded. And McFarland, a name everybody knows, sailed his yacht from Hawaii to San Francisco in 1906 to accept a challenge. From boats up in San Francisco Yacht Club. And the day he sailed into San Francisco in 1906 was the day the earthquake in San Francisco was on fire. And back then sailboats had cotton sails and cotton burns. So they decided the safest thing to do was immediately turn around, so back out the Golden Gate and down to Los Angeles. And then so the race then started that year in Los Angeles to Honolulu. And that's how it's been run ever since. It sounds like the race is deeply embedded with Hawaii history. Back to the royalty. And the overall corrected winner trophy is the Kaua Kaua Cup. And it's beautiful. It's priceless. And it's been awarded 50 times. Yeah. And there are people in Hawaii who race. I mean there are some of the boats that race that come from Hawaii that are home ported here. And they sail up to Los Angeles to race it. And it's not just the racers though. It takes about 600 volunteers both on the Los Angeles side and Long Beach to organize it and send them get them started. And then the Honolulu committee which Carl manages is about 500 volunteers that perform a lot of different functions. Nature. And I know the Diamond Head Bowie is just a seaward of the Diamond Head Light, right? That's correct. And that's where the Coast Guard Adderall's house is at. That's correct. We have to every race we have to gain permission from the mainland to utilize the Lighthouse and receive the Adderall's permission because that's his private property. Three people at a time are allowed up in the Diamond Head Lighthouse. And if you've never been there it's incredible. I have been there. I was in the Coast Guard. Yes. And so you go up in that Lighthouse and there's actually a tube up there that's sighted right across the Diamond Head Bowie and a person actually looks through that too. Well, another person's on the clock on an official clock and they mark it when they cross. And then the communications begin and the whole welcoming ceremony and everything starts happening. It's spectacular really. I've seen some of it. Have you gentlemen crewed on boats that have made the trip? Yeah. I sailed my first trans pack in 1975 when I was in college. Took 13 and a half days. Yeah. How'd you do? Not great, but we had a great time. What are the challenges of crewing? I mean, first of all, you can't get seasick, right? Never. It's not permitted. That's right. But it's a lot of physical labor involved. It's not only physical labor, it's mental labor because each person has a responsibility not only to themselves, but to every crew member on board. And so it really teaches teamwork. Yeah. We've talked before about the technology on these boats and I'd like to spend a minute on that. Bo, you were saying that there's a lot of new technology and that makes the competition all the more competitive. What kind of technology are we talking about? Well, in the old days, back in the 50s, the boats were made of wood. And then in the 60s, they were made of fiberglass. And then they were made of fiberglass with home cores to be stronger and lighter. And then the real breakthroughs, really this came out of America's Cup Technology, was building boats of solid carbon fiber. Very expensive. You got to build big ovens to bake these hulls. Oh, I'm sure. And then it evolved to not just hulls, every part on the boat, the winches, the toilet seats, the steering wheels all made out of carbon. Then they took it to another layer and they started building the mass out of carbon fiber and the shrouds. And this is just very, very expensive. But the boats get lighter and lighter and faster and faster. Can you explain the physics of that to me? I mean, so they're lighter, why does that necessarily mean they're faster? Does light mean fast? Yeah, because the boats get up in plane where they basically can reduce their wetted surface the faster they go and the lighter you make the boat. And they use a lot of technology around the keels and making the keels more efficient and deeper so they get more leverage so they can put more sail up bigger mass, bigger rigs. All that gives more power. So if you've got more, it's like a race car. You've got a bigger engine but a lighter chassis. The car's going to go faster, same with boats. And the sails, I assume the sails should be lighter too. So the last time I looked at one of these sails it was heavy. They got lighter? Well, they've gotten stronger and they're basically made out of exotic materials now that hold their shapes perfect for longer periods but they're much more expensive now. And yes, they're not light because the sail rigs, the sail plans have gotten bigger. They've got to be strong because tearing would not work on a race, if at all. So what about the navigational equipment? Has that changed? We're going back to the 50s. I mean, we didn't have GPS, we didn't have all the satellites up there. They were doing sextant navigation, navigating by the stars. And they didn't have the radio communications we have today. They were much on their own once they left on the race because the communication was not the same way as we have it today. No tracking systems, etc. Today's race is all about safety. That's the number one consideration. And so a lot of the equipment is all about system backup system and safety. Just in case something does happen out there that there's a way to recover from that situation. But the navigators, each boat has a navigator. And Transpac is called a navigator's race. There's a lot of navigating. This you do not sail a straight line to Hawaii because of the Pacific High. So the real question is how far do you go south? And then how close to the Pacific High do you pass? Because the winds get lighter to Hawaii. So the navigators make all the calls on this. Yeah, so I really would like to know about that. It's all about tacking, right? And dealing with... It's a giant downwind, but yeah. Okay, sorry, that's the right term. But to Hawaii, you sail what's called a reverse S-course. So the rough line would be a straight line. But there's this thing called the Pacific High and that's what generates the trade winds that sits out there. Well, in the middle of the high there's no wind. So the question is, you've got to sail, if a straight line is the shortest distance, but you've got to sail, you're trying to do this as a navigator, how do I keep the boat going as fast as possible, knowing how to sail more miles, but not too many more miles in the competition at all times. And jibangles and have, you know, experts. And that's why a navigator's worth the most important guy on a boat. He saves you going places you don't need to go. And he tells you when to tack. He tells the captain when to tack, which is very important because that's critical. Keep the angles as efficient. Yeah, yeah, ooh, exciting. And the captain, who is the captain on a boat like this? It's generally the owner of the guy right in the checks. Okay, but it doesn't have to be. Oh, well, no, he can, the owner, if he wants to or is too old to not go, then he assigns a skipper who runs the boat in his absence. Professional. Generally a professional hired skipper. And these are world-class. A lot of these are America's Cup skippers. They're out on the pro-circuit sailing around the world. This is at the top end of the fleet. Oh, exciting. Let's talk metrics for a minute. Okay. How long? How wide? How much displacement? What's the size of the crew? I'll break that down. How long? How wide? Some boats only have a crew of two. Some boats have a crew of 20. It just all depends on, you know, the bigger, the more manpower it takes many times. There's the aloha class, which is essentially a cruising class. And many of them head over as if they're cruising to Hawaii, but they're racing. And they- It's more casual, though. It's more casual. And they, yes, they can do margaritas at happy hour. But not the real serious ones. They don't do that. So it just all depends on where the comfort level of the skipper and, you know, from a safety perspective, also from a comfort's perspective, and how long your watch is going to be, et cetera. Yeah. Okay. And how fast do they go? And how long is it taken to get on Long Beach to Hawaii? Well, the fleet ranges in size from 31 feet to 100 feet. And the 100-foot record was set last race by Comanche, which is entered again with a new owner this time from Australia. It was a US owner when it was originally built. And they did the course last time in five days, one hour and a couple minutes. Which is kind of a record. That was really fast. That set the record. And we also set the multi-haul record last year. A little over four days. Okay. And they carry all their food. They carry all their water. Nobody resupplies them. And do they have, I don't know if you know this fellow, Bill Meyer. He's a physicist from Stanford. He has a boat. He sails all oceans. And he has a little phone about that big. Yes, yes. All his boats have satellite phones. And that's how they send their email positions in. If they have a safety issue, they can call us and get the Coast Guard hookup. They also use their satellite phone capabilities to download weather information. Each boat has a transponder on it. And yellow bricks are a vendor for tracking. And everyone on the race and everyone at home can go online and pull down the position on all their competitors in the race. I was going to ask you about that. We do it on our foot. Since it's a navigator's race and if the navigator wants to move on a competitor, we put a four-hour delay on the public view. So you can't find out where you are in real time. Right. You know, because if somebody has an idea, I want to go south even for the next two hours. We don't want to let them single it what their move is. They'll find out four hours from now. But you can learn from watching the other guy's moves, right? Right, that's right. So I mean the whole fleet's kind of watching, but mainly the individual classes. The fleet's poking down for handicap purposes in the classes. So you're really in a race and it gets your class. But you do watch how the guys in front of you, the bigger boats are doing and how they're moving because you take that information and your decision as a navigator. It must be really thrilling to be on a race like this. I mean, whether you're in a cruising class boat or a competitor, I mean, what would you call the other kind? Oh, Grand Prix. Grand Prix, you know. It must be really exciting. I mean, I remember seeing photos of them hanging off the sail during the attack and they're all the way back. They're over the water, am I right? This is pretty thrilling. Yeah, it's pretty wet. These boats are pretty wet when they're going very fast. Some of these boats, as Carl has mentioned before, one of the big multi-hulls, Maserati, Carl's sailed on it before and they've hit, what'd you say? 45 knots. 45 knots and, you know, sustained 35 knots is not a problem at all. You go through bursts of speed, but it's just, it's something you've never experienced or you never will. You're a train that's running all the time. It is. And it's a sleep below decks because I went on it from Okinawa, Japan to Hong Kong after the last Trans-Pac race. It's like a freight train is running right beside the boat all night long because that's how fast you're going through them. That's noise. It's the sound of the water. The sound of the water. Yes. You never have a moment of rest, I guess. You get tired, so yes you do, but you can just, you know, small little doses of sleep. You catch a little sleep when you can. That's right. Wow. You have to be strong, don't you? I mean, not everybody can do this. So who qualifies and how do they select the crews? The guys who, you know, pull the winches and climb the mast, they climb the mast? And, you know, that requires a lot, especially because the boat is moving it. They're not climbing the mast. Someone's grinding them up the mast. But they're hanging on to the shroud to go up the mast. So how do you find people that can do this? I'm sure that, you know, they don't grow on trees. Maybe they grow on masts. Well, in a lot of cases, most cases people start in junior programs and yachting, and like the three yacht clubs here in Hawaii have junior programs, and then you get asked, you know, I'm a doctor, maybe go out on a bigger size boat and you perform there and you get asked out again. A lot of our kids go off to sail in college, and they get invited as their strong college sailors to go sail on some of these boats. Some of them are in junior Olympic training programs and get asked to go screw on some of these boats just in the background. Some people just pick it up on their dock at their local club and start sailing, you know, without a junior experience, just going down on the beer can races and start crewing. And if they have an aptitude to tour it and take, they just do it over time. They learn the job. You know, I mean, this is important for Hawaii in terms of the Hawaii history of it, although not everybody knows about it. Maybe we should discuss it. We are discussing it for that reason. You know, but I wonder where the trans-back race fits in the world of racing. Because you mentioned, what was it, the cup? The Kau Kau Cup. Overall, corrected. A lot of races in every continent, I suppose, and people have these fabulous boats, they can go there and participate. And I wonder where the trans-back fits in the landscape of global sailboat racing. Well, trans-back and the Newport Bermuda race, which is the major East Coast race, start in the same year. And they're the two oldest and choose running blue ocean races in the world. And trans-back is always considered one of the top five races in the world, a bucket race for almost everybody to go get your ticket punch that you've done in trans-back. And that's what keeps people coming back or new boats from all around the world coming to race. And part of it is it's a race primarily downwind off the wind and it gets warmer every day you're on the race. And at the end, you're on the last few thirds of the race, you're in shorts and t-shirts and you generally don't have to wear fall weather gear at that time. So it's famous for its finish. Every boat gets its own arrival party when it gets to a lot of them. No other race in the world does that. I want to talk about that after the break. That's Beau Wheeler and Karl Geringer and both captains of their own boats and both heavily involved in trans-back. After this break, I want to talk about some of the emergency gear you carry. And I want to talk about what's like when people arrive in July. Ooh, I want you to put me there. Put me there at Diamond Head. Tell me what it's like. We'll be right back after this break. Aloha, I'm Lauren Pair, a host here at Think Tech, Hawaii. A digital media company serving the people of Hawaii. We provide a video platform for citizen journalists to raise public awareness in Hawaii. We are a Hawaii non-profit that depends on the generosity of its supporters to keep on going. We'd be grateful if you'd go to thinktechhawaii.com and make a donation to support us now. Thanks so much. Hi, I'm Rusty Kamori, host of Beyond the Lines on Think Tech, Hawaii. My show is based on my book also titled Beyond the Lines and it's about creating a superior culture of excellence, leadership, and finding greatness. I interview guests who are successful in business, sports, and life, which is sure to inspire you in finding your greatness. Join me every Monday as we go Beyond the Lines at 11 a.m. Aloha. Hey, we've got Bo Wheeler. He's a Commodore or a staff Commodore. What's a Commodore? Well, Transpecific Yacht Club is an organization that organizes and runs the race. It was started in 1926. It's the governing body for the race. There's a board of directors that we both sit on and there's about 25 members on the board. And we put together the notice of race, the sailing instructions, what rules the race is going to be conducted on. And a big part of that is what are the safety requirements that we run for the race. So let's talk about that. What I get, by the way, from what you said is that this is the headquarters for the race. This is where that committee meets. I mean, the board, it happens here where you make the rules. It happens here when you create all the procedural requirements and schedules. We take entries for people who are, am I right? It's happening right here. Well, it's the board members of lots of different yacht clubs around the country. And we do meet sometimes on the West Coast. We often just do it by phone. But it's the organizing group. And for safety, we've never had a safety incident. And we're renowned for having the highest safety standards of all races. Knockwood, yes. And if there are incidents of sailing accidents around the world, members of our organization are often recruited to be part of the investigative body doing the incident reports and writing conclusions afterwards. And often the recommendations that come out of that. Oh, you do debriefing after you trace. You learn from every race. Well, and accidents where the coast guard may ask us to be part of the review. Because they're going to do an investigation, too, yeah. And so the international yachting community often adopts those recommendations. So the safety standards go up every year. What about the safety equipment? Yeah. And that's part of the standards. I mean, if you were going to start... The boats are required to have certain kinds of equipment. Yes, every boat. And we have inspections before they can leave Long Beach. They have to have all that gear on board. And then we have inspections here when they arrive. That's good. To make sure they have it all. And they save weight. They didn't leave it on the dock. Because that would save some weight. And for the average... Lighter and faster. For the average owner, if you're going to do your first trans-pack and you haven't been playing the game, it's probably 40,000 of safety equipment. You got to have life rafts. You have to have E-Purb. Beacons. Beacons. Most boats have personal beacons for all of them. You got to have inflatable safety. You got gear on the... You got to have harnesses. You got to have tethers to snap you onto jack lines on the boat when you go overboard. You got to have strobe lights, whistles. You got to have satellite phones. You got to have life raft of emergency gear to drop over the board if someone goes aside. You got to have man overboard buttons at the helm, which marks a GPS position if someone goes overboard. Somebody goes overboard. Somebody at the helm. Somebody pushes a button. Now we know where that person is. Throw him a life raft or a life ring. Yeah, and then you try to stop the sailboat. You have someone looking at that person. Somebody watching him. Yeah. It would be harder if the seas were high. Right, it is. So that gear, generally you drop over, automatically inflates a pole with a flag on it to help and a strobe to help see in the waves. And hopefully the swimmer sees it to demand overboard and swim to that to make it easier to recover him. That is the one thing you worry about more than anything. Somebody goes overboard in high seas in a fast maneuver and then you lose them somehow. You can't find them and then you are open ocean. So everyone worries about that. So in safeties the highest standards on these races and the gear. Every system you could possibly have you want to have. So, Carl, you are the committee chair of the Honolulu committee. I get that right. That is correct. Of the trans-pac. That is right. What happens after the boats leave California, everything starts falling in our lap unless there is an issue at sea or something like that. But for the most part the entire race moves to Hawaii. And what we have to do is in a perfect world we would schedule them when they finish and arrange the parties at certain times. And we would all go to sleep. That is not the way it works. It starts that way but it doesn't finish that way. So this year we will have 106, I will say over 100 boats that are going to finish here in Hawaii. Every one of them is going to cross the Diamondhead finish line. We have to communicate with every boat. So once they start getting close to Hawaii it starts setting off all kinds of happenings. Like what? First of all the communications start coming in. We start notifying from the welcoming committee to the families and friends of the boat. We start sending out word the boat. We have an ETA of this time. This must be very exciting and very fun. It is. So a great job to have to tell everybody that the boat is coming in. That is right. So there is all of these committees that work towards do this. And Diamondhead Lighthouse then has the first real physical contact with the boat. They see them. They finish them. They hand them off to a follow me boat which is a boat waiting for them at the Diamondhead buoy escort them to wherever their mooring is going to be. There is an important point there. Is that when they are making the trip from Long Beach there is no follow me boat. No. They are by themselves. They are independent, self-reliant. They can't have a follow boat. Yeah. That is right. They only get the follow boat when they come in close. That is right. That is to get them through our reefs and stuff and get them safely into our harbors. To pilot. And I can say I don't remember if it was two years ago or four years ago but we had a major south swell which closed all the harbors on the south side and we had to hold the boats off as they finished off of Waikiki and we had boats out there to keep them at a distance and they were not allowed to come into the harbor. Yeah. You could wreck your boat. Yes. Yes. And that was an incredible job for to get them into the harbor the next day because the swells were still very dangerous but they weren't closed out anymore. So they come in they finish at Diamondhead Bowie there at Diamondhead Light. But are people up there in the light you can walk up to the top of the light. They're up there with binoculars watching for them. There's three trans-packed personnel up there. That's it. I want that job. And so they you know they announced the finish and then the follow me boat escorts them that's about 45 minutes. Then there's the voice of trans-pack that welcomes them into the alloy harbor through loudspeakers etc. Cool. And then they're taken down to their slip and there's a group of peer operations personnel tie them up keep everybody on the boat. Make it make sure enough slips are available. That's right. 106 boats so it takes 106 slips. Then what happens is the inspections committee hops on board and they do the necessary inspections and sign off on necessary paperwork. We have to deal with Department of Agriculture collect those forms those inspections. It's some point in time after the dust settles then the Mai Thais come on board and there's a crew photo taken with everybody on the deck of the boat holding their pineapple Mai Thai. And they're famous part of the race. And their race that's right and the family's just going crazy. Families you know the girlfriends boyfriends whoever it may be they're waiting for them and then there's a party hosted by the Ohana here in Hawaii. The trans-packed Ohana. That's right. One great big party. Yeah. For each one gets an individual party. Each one gets a separate party. Yes. Okay, wow. And it's known as the best Aloha welcome of any yacht race in the world. We would expect nothing less, Carl. And we will not give him anything but the best. Okay, so they said they stay here for a little vacation in a few days. The boat stays in the slip at Hawaii was it? Now what happens after that? Do they head on back where they came from? Some boats go cruising for a little while. Some have the delivery crews get ready to load them up provision and put fuel on and sail them to their next point. The next race. They can't use a motor during the trip but afterward they can use a motor. And then some of the boats go down to Keihe or San Island and the rigs are taken down. The boats are lifted out of the water and put on cradles and then they're put on Asha and or Mattson or other transported back on a ship. Why not sail them back? Some of the owners don't want to put the wear and tear on these machines of extra miles particularly going upwind. And to get back to the west coast you've got to go pretty hard north for a long time. It's harder to go east than it is to go west, okay. And it's harder on the boats and the sails, the rigs. So if guys can write the check to have the boat ship they prefer to do that. Yes. Interesting. There's some other interesting things that happen though. Once they're here race headquarters coordinates a lot of activities and that's in the L.O.I. Yacht Harbor. But also we have the award ceremony and this time the first time ever it's going to be at the White Convention Center because the group is so big. That's the only facility that can hold all the participants and their family and friends. So that happens on Friday, July 26th. I'm going to make a note of that because I'd like to come down there and take pictures of it, you know. So one last question if you guys are almost out of time. And that is where is this all going? It's been in existence since what 1906. It's going strong. That's the title of our show. It's going strong. Well, this is our biggest race. It's we got 106 or 107 entries right now. The prior record was 80. So by being the 50th gold anniversary it's really, really big this year. But the race kind of ebbs and flows with international economics. When the economy is good software there's just less people. This takes a lot of discretionary income to do the race. So sports activities are always useful for the state, aren't they? Oh, well, think about all these people that are flying in to see their friends and families finish. They're staying in hotels. These owners have a lot of money. They're in very nice restaurants and buying a lot of booze for their crews. Their crews are generally being put up in hotels and timeshares and Waikiki. Then there's crew dinners at all our restaurants in town. Then there's the Hawaii Yacht Club and Waikiki Yacht Club have big parties. So a lot of tickets with a lot of entertainment. And then there's 105 separate parties. So there's a pretty big economic impact on Waikiki for this race. All those parties, I guess, I'm really curious to know you have your official duties here, gentlemen, as part of the committee and everything in the board. How are you going to get to visit 106 or seven parties? That's a real chore. I hope you can work that out without stressing yourself too much. We'll do our best. We've had practice. Yes. Practice makes perfect. Thank you, Carl. Thank you. Carl Garinger. Bo, thank you very much. Bo Wheeler. Great discussion. Good luck on the race. Thanks so much. Thank you. Thank you.