Hosted by the Three Tree Point Yacht Club, the Duwamish Head Race is the second of four events in the Southern Sound Series, and this year’s race was a light wind affair that took skill and perseverance to finish.

For most, if not all of us, Duwamish Head is also the first race of the new year, and brings its own fresh-start excitement. It always proves to be an interesting day on the water for us aboard my Antrim 27, Goes to 11. The course leaves Des Moines heading north around Alki to the turn at Duwamish Head. From there, it’s a westward crossing of Puget Sound to leave Blakely Rock to port, and back to Des Moines. Well, at least that’s what happens if there’s wind.

Kicking off 2026, most boats probably found that Des Moines Marina was under construction, so those hoping for an easier delivery or a spot to stay after the race were left disappointed, unfortunately. Here’s hoping future years return to the predictable accommodations for visitors joining this great race. 

The forecast throughout the week suggested a light air race and as the models settled in near the Saturday morning start, it looked like it would be a light day for sure. Still, just before the race began, we were blessed with clearing skies and sunshine and enough of a gentle southerly to bring us all out to the course.

After a very short postponement, the cruising classes and PHRF 6 and 7 got off to a decent start. As the sequence got underway for our class, PHRF 5, boats jockeyed for position; but the wind completely faded. No boats made it across the start for several minutes after our start and an enthusiastic “all-clear” signal came over the radio. Thanks for that! The race committee then went straight into a postponement for the next few starts.

After several grueling and tenuous minutes, Sidewinder, an Olson 30, was able to get across the start line. They were followed by our sistership -gnarwhal and the Melges 24 Take off! We eventually were able to sail Goes to 11 across the start line to the welcome and much-needed cheers from the race committee above on the pier. 

I was excited to launch our new bright pink A1.5, which we’d nicknamed Raspberry, and as we passed through the start line we prepped to get it flying. We were able to launch our kite and make our way towards Three Tree Point. We appeared to be gaining on the fleet, which only meant we were probably sailing into another hole up ahead. Sure enough, as we reached Three Tree Point the wind backed off, and we came to a screeching halt. 

By this time, we had seen the starts recommence behind us, with the PHRF 2 and 3, as well as the ORC fleet chasing us down with their spinnakers flying in the sunshine. As we watched the first of the largest and fastest boats catch up, they came barrelling past Three Tree Point only to wither out just past the point where we did. The bigger, more powerful boats were able to carry their momentum quite a bit farther than we were. We jibed out as we saw a glimmer of hope on the western side of the channel and ended up roughly following the Riptide 41 Blue as they also went chasing the wind line to the west. 

It appeared that boats going along the easternmost shoreline were making decent progress northward, but there were definitely some large holes to overcome. As we were able to stay in the slightly building breeze along the western portion of the channel, several other boats headed our way trying to get away from the eastern shoreline. We were able to pass one of our fellow PHRF 5 boats as they were stuck in the hole just south of Alki. 

And then came Alki. When we arrived, the rain had made its way in and the writing was on the wall that the committee would be shortening the course. The slog from Alki to the shortened course finish at Duwamish Head took hours. Cheryl White on PHRF 3 winning J/35 Grace E summed it up after the race, “Duwamish Head. Cold. Dark. Little to no breeze. Debris everywhere. The last two miles to the finish took us two hours.” That can be winter racing on Puget Sound.

On Goes to 11, we got to share those last two miles with Grace E as we paced each other in the minimal wind and pouring rain, wringing whatever tenth-of-a-knot of boat speed we could wring out of our soaking sails. We even tried a spinnaker change, as our poor (old) spinnaker was so water logged it couldn’t have helped even if we did get a whisper of breeze. We clawed our way to the finish line—alas, the only triumph was in completion, since we were a mere three hours behind the winner of the day -gnarwhal who finished with an incredible corrected time of just over three hours and twenty minutes. Well done!

I could tell you that sailboat racing is fun, easy, and glamorous, but it’s not so; and for us, what followed was the worst part of our day. We finished right at dusk, so we trudged all the way home to the South Sound through Colvos Passage in the damp, dreary, dark. 

The biggest lesson of the day is not what Duwamish Head was in 2026, but what it could have been. We all may wish that we had some more breeze to get around the course faster, but this light air day may have been a blessing in disguise. After significant flooding events and winter King tides, I have never seen more logs in Puget Sound than I did on our way back south. As one of my crew pointed out, we wouldn’t have been able to see or avoid nearly as many of the monster logs the glassy-calm flat water allowed if we had been going fast in choppy waters. Other boats even reported they had a watch on the bow with a boat hook just to creatively relocate the logs in their path, never gaining any competitive advantage, of course.

Congrats go out to -gnarwhal for first overall, J/80 Afterburner second overall, and Sidewinder coming in third overall. Goes to 11 was lucky enough to finish third in our class. We were just happy to make it to the finish line, and then home with minimal scratches on the hull. Custom 40 Madrona, Blue, and TP52 Mist took the top three in the ORC class. The Class wins in the PHRF fleet went to J/160 Jam (PHRF 2), Grace E (PHRF 3), –gnarwhal (PHRF 5), Afterburner (PHRF 6), Ranger 33 Aurora (PHRF 7), and Hanse 350 Nighthawk (PHRF 10 Cruising Flying Sails). 

Happy racing, and we hope to see friendlier conditions and a great turnout at the next of the Southern Sound Series, Toliva Shoal out of Olympia on Valentine’s Day!

Full results at: www.ssssclub.com/southern-sound-series-racing/

Feature photo courtesy of Dale Johnson.