Emil Bus Mosbacher Sportsmanship Trophy

At the 2015 Storm Trysail Block Island Race Week, Josh Burack (New Rochelle, NY), owner of J/105 Peregrina, won the Emil “Bus” Mosbacher Sportsmanship Trophy. Peregrina lost its mast in Tuesday’s Round the Island Race when a shroud broke. The mast folded in half at the top spreader. Burack then volunteered for Race Committee duty and was placed on a safety boat. Prior to racing on Wednesday, fellow J/105 competitor Damian Emery’s Eclipse (Shoreham, NY), a two-time Block Island winner, broke its gooseneck during practice before the day’s first race. Burack raced back to Champlin’s Marina, removed the gooseneck fitting from his broken mast, and got it to Eclipse with time to spare. “Before we left the dock on Wednesday, we noticed a crack in the gooseneck, but decided it would likely be fine until the end of the week, but of course the moment we went up with the main, it busted,” said Dave Shrader, trimmer on Eclipse. “If it wasn’t for Josh running in and stripping the gooseneck off his stricken boat for us, it would’ve been a lot worse. We didn’t even miss a race,” he said. “It’s this sort of camaraderie and respect for one another that makes Race Week so special.” The J/105 Class was decided on the last day, where Emery’s Eclipse staged a come-from-behind victory to win the class and the J/105 East Coast Championship. Eclipse was placed fourth after Wednesday’s racing, 11 points out of first, but finished the regatta with a 1-2-1-2 to score a 1 point victory over Paul Beaudin’s loulou (New York, NY). 2009 Storm Trysail Race Week winner Bruce Stone’s Team Arbitrage (San Francisco, CA) was another four points back to take third. Stone reported hitting his career high speed in a J/105, surfing at 20.9 kt over the ground when winning the Around Island Race in 30+ kt of wind. “It turned out that we had no working instruments on our chartered boat, Play Station, but were able to log the SOG using our Velocitek ProStart. We maintained a sustained surf both faster and of longer duration than even on SF Bay, despite the bigger waves. What a hoot! We’ll be back at Block Island in 2017.” (photo credit Nicole Breault)