By Rubin E. Grant
Laura Jelks was 10 when her dad introduced her to sailing. They would go out on their Sunfish boat, a personal-size, beach-launched sailing dinghy, to sail on Cross Lake in Shreveport, Louisiana, where Jelks grew up.
Jelks crewed a lot, but once she went to college at Louisiana Tech and then got married and started having children, she stopped sailing.
She and her husband, Huff Jelks, settled in Houston for 10 years while he worked as an offshore engineer. When he switched his career focus, they moved to Birmingham in 1988. Huff Jelks is a senior structural engineer at Southern Company.
In the 1990s, the Jelks joined the Birmingham Sailing Club, but they weren’t too active because their weekends, which were the only time they could sail, were busy with Laura Jelks’ working as a real estate agent. She’s now a real estate agent with ARC Realty in Cahaba Heights.
Two years ago, after the COVID-19 pandemic moderated, the Jelks decided it was time to return to the water with the folks in the sailing club. They live in Inverness, and the club, located at Logan Martin Lake, isn’t too far from their home.
“It’s all about having fun,” Laura Jelks said. “There are not a lot of people who do it, but it’s a close group with some wonderful people who welcomed us back with open arms. We’re having a ball.”
At the end of this month, the Jelks will do something they have never done before. They will participate in a national sailing competition when the Birmingham Sailing Club hosts The Flying Scot Sailing Association’s 2023 Wife-Husband National Regatta on Sept. 29-Oct. 1.
“I think it’s pretty unreal we’ll be hosting since it is a national regatta,” Laura Jelks said.
“I’m kind of excited,” Huff Jelks said. “We sail together all the time, but mostly in club regattas and club races.”
Great Scot!
The Flying Scot sailboat is a 19-foot-long, centerboard spinnaker sloop that will be crewed by a married couple for the five-race regatta.
“Most people who sail them are older because they are a more stable boat,” Laura Jelks said.
Thirty-five teams from more than 10 states are expected to trailer in with their boats to compete in two divisions, Championship and Challenger, for trophy honors.
The Jelks are both 66-years-old, and they have been married for 43 years. They have a son and daughter and six grandchildren. They will compete in the Challenger division.
“The people in the championship fleet have been sailing for 50 years,” Laura Jelks said. “We’re going to try to stay out of their way.”
The Jelks will sail in a boat that is unofficially named “Yayi’s Escape.”
“We tried to get my grandchildren to call me Lolly, but it came out Yayi,” Laura Jelks said with a laugh. “One time my hairdresser asked me what was the name of my boat, and I told him that story and he said I should name it Yayi’s Escape since when we’re on the water we escape from everything else.”
The racecourse will be managed by a certified race officer from South Carolina with local sailing club members supporting him to set marks that the boats must round to complete the race. Each race requires the competitors to sail upwind and downwind on a two-lap course that typically takes 45 minutes to 1 hour to complete.
Sailboat racing involves careful timing to start at the gun in the favorable position on the line. The first leg after the start is to a marker buoy directly upwind, requiring teams to choose the best angle to steer and side of the course that will provide the most advantage to arrive at the mark the quickest.
The second leg after rounding the upwind mark is directly downwind. Spinnakers are used on the downwind leg, but to which side of the boat that this larger sail is set is a team decision.
Right of way rules come into play as boats approach each other during the race. Sailing skill, boat handling, correct decision-making and luck are part of each team’s success.
The Jelks are more interested in enjoying themselves than winning the national regatta.
“We just want to have fun,” Laura Jelks said. “I hope we do well, but it will depend on the wind. If it’s blowing 15 mph or more, we can’t hold the boat and then we’ll be in survivor mode.”
“I don’t know how it will turn out,” Huff Jelks said. “I’m just going to take orders from my wife, like I always do.”
