‘Largest’ Yacht Race Begins Today With Field of 441

Sailboats of all descriptions will leave Newport Beach for Ensenada, Baja California, today in the 53rd edition of what is billed as the world’s largest international yacht race.

Starting at noon, guns will fire every 10 minutes until all 441 have gone--boats big and small, old and new, one sailed entirely by women and others by septuagenarians. They’ll use three starting lines laid end to end off the beach.

In the late 1940s and ‘50s Ensenada was a small fishing village without the myriad lights that now define Todos Santos Bay and confuse navigators trying to find the finish line after dark.

For the first time, organizers will use a green and yellow laser beacon 100 meters tall to guide boats in after their 125-nautical-mile voyage down the coast.

Entries drawing interest include Christy Schisler’s O Baby O, a Soverel 33 from San Diego with five other women as crew, and Dennis Conner’s new 40-foot J/120 Stars & Stripes. The latter is not to be confused with any of Conner’s several America’s Cup boats of that name, or with his former catamaran that Steve Fossett sailed to a record of 6 hours 46 minutes 40 seconds in 1998. Conner just likes the name.

A typical veteran is Lou Comyns, 73, of Long Beach, who will be sailing his Cal 40 Ahsante in his 45th race, with his 12-year-old grandson Joel aboard.

The record for monohulls is 11 hours 54 minutes set by Roy Disney’s Pyewacket, also in ’98. Now Disney sails a newer Pyewacket--he likes that name--that lowered his Transpac record to 7 1/2 days last year.

In normal conditions, the boats could be expected to finish from early Saturday morning through Sunday.