Eugene Yacht Club’s always fun and unique Live on the Edge Multihull Regatta pulled some extra heartstrings in 2026.
Sometimes the biggest blessings come from the smallest places!
Take, for instance, the MadCatter 50 Hobie Cat regatta in Syracuse, New York, held this year on May 14-17. Shale Pagel of Ashland, Oregon and I traveled out for this 50-year reunion of old… er… long-time friends and were greeted by over 100 Hobies (and even more pals) for what was, by any measure, a big and exciting regatta!
Fast forward just three weeks to the Fern Ridge Reservoir outside of Eugene, Oregon and another group of friends assembled for the Live on the Edge Multihull Regatta. This year’s event drew a whopping 20 boats—measurably smaller than MadCatter, but differently remarkable.
Live on the Edge is unique in many ways. It is open to any boat with more than one hull, and this year included Hobie Cats, A-Cats, a Prindle, and Weta trimarans. Classes with fewer than five boats were handicapped using the Portsmouth yardstick. The regatta uses a SailGP-style course with a reaching leg as the initial and final legs. And one last thing that sets Live on the Edge apart is the awards structure, with both a class and overall trophies as well as a team award. Teams of three or four boats are randomly drawn across all the fleets. Competitors still get to race within their respective fleet, but scores are combined with their teammates to determine the overall Jerry Valeske winner.
My crew, Holly Deuterman, and I traveled to the event with one goal: win the Jerry Valeske Team Trophy. This trophy is named after a good friend of mine and big Hobie contributor, who passed prematurely in 2018 while leading the Hobie 18 fleet around the weather mark at Lake Quinault with his crew Jennifer Olegario.
We wanted to win this one to honor Jerry, and give whatever prize was given to his spouse, Laura Sullivan (also a huge Hobie contributor). The prospects for achieving our goal looked good on Saturday morning when we learned we were teamed up with some friends (and good sailors!): Kelly Havig on the Hobie 17 and Tim and Jonathan Webb on the Hobie 18. We had a Weta sailor on our team as well whom we were not familiar with (and who eventually did not race).
The first race Saturday was an eye-opener and caught everyone’s attention. The locals were saying they had never seen the lake so violently puffy. We were in survival mode. Many of the puffs were 10-15 knots over the median 5-knot wind, and we only just managed to save ourselves from flipping at least half-dozen times in that opening race! After crossing the finish line, we set a new goal: don’t go home on a stretcher!
The puffs subsided after that initial onslaught, and we got to shore in one piece after a few more races. We were hanging on to first place with a scoreline of 1-1-2-2, ahead of Bryan Simpson and Bridgette O’Brien by a single point (3-2-1-1). Bryan and Bridgette sailed smart those last two races, and when we tacked away from the lead on the last lap and fell into a hole, I’m pretty sure you could have heard the ‘gulp’ in my throat from shore!
Sunday showed up with no wind, and was uneventful; except for the tiny matter of Bryan and Bridgette sailing off for another bullet while we struggled to a third. That secured the Hobie 16 class win for Bryan and Bridgette. Congrats!
This is where the story gets really interesting. At the awards, an emotional Bryan shared that he had lost his sailing mentor just two months prior, and this victory was all about Tom. This heartfelt acceptance made for a meaningful close, and it would have made a lovely ending. But then came another development that made the event all the more special—it wasn’t until Tuesday evening when we received an email from the regatta organizers. They found a scoring error which resulted in our team of Holly, Tim, Jonathan, and Kelly winning the Jerry Valeske Trophy!
Mission accomplished. These ‘little’ details—the occasions to honor departed dear friends while sailing in this terrific ‘little’ regatta—overshadowed the expanse of joy we gained in Syracuse at the ‘bigger’ regatta. It goes to show that we shouldn’t underestimate smaller events. As is so often the case with sailing and community, unexpected significance may be found around every corner.
Full results at www.eugeneyachtclub.org
Title background photo of the author’s team by Richard Johnson.
