The Wind a Winner for Astor : Sailing: A strong wind backed a strong prediction by Skipper Richard Straman as Astor won the Class ‘A’ fleet race by more than two minutes over Dauntless.

Skipper Richard Straman didn’t mean to sound cocky when he proclaimed before the fourth America’s Schooner Cup: “If it’s a windy day, we’ll win. Simple as that.”

It was about that simple Saturday on San Diego Bay.

Straman’s schooner, Astor, received large doses of wind throughout the day and sailed away with the Class ‘A’ fleet race by more than two minutes over Dauntless.

“It wasn’t as windy as we would have liked, but we got all the wind we needed,” Straman said.

Straman and his 12-man crew will have to root for the wind again as Astor faces Dauntless at noon today in a match race for the Schooner Cup.

“We’re hoping it doesn’t blow out,” Straman said. “It looks like this system will hold.”

Dauntless, skippered by Paul Plotts, gained the right to meet Astor by virtue of its second place finish. Two-time defending champion, Kelpie, would have met Astor for the second consecutive year, but structural damage sidelined the schooner until next year’s race.

When asked what Dauntless’ chances were today if the wind held, Straman said: “There’s not a whole lot they can do. The history has been, whenever the wind’s up, we beat Dauntless. When it’s not, Dauntless wins. Paul’s just a great light-wind sailor.”

Straman said one of the keys to Astor’s easy victory, besides the wind, was its start.

“Everybody else was doing a starboard start, but we did a port start and dove across the starting line,” Straman said. “We just had a tremendous advantage on everybody. And then we just began to pull away.”

Last year Straman said his port start was also successful.

“We blew away the field by 16 minutes,” he said.

But after his excellent start, Straman said a tactical error almost let Dauntless, the 1987 America’s Schooner Cup Champion, back in the race.

“We got a little too conservative about the halfway point and Dauntless started gaining on us,” Straman said. “In retrospect, we probably should have changed sails.”

Bagheera, one of the pre-race favorites, finished well back in third place and will race today for the consolation title.