By the time you read this, Team MZEE and Let Loose The Goose have probably already hit the beach in Port Townsend, high-fiving strangers and ringing any bell they can find. Or maybe they’re still dueling it out in Admiralty Inlet, battling one last legendary foul current.
Either way, the finish line is firmly in sight—and for almost everyone else, the race is already over. Most teams have been sleeping in their own beds for a week or more, sunburned, blistered, and trying to explain to their coworkers what exactly they’ve been doing for the past two weeks.
So yeah: WA360 2.0 is in the books. And what a helluva book it was.
More wind. More calms. More…more.
Eighty-four teams crossed the Port Townsend start line on June 28 to the sound of a cannon, Rick Astley, and the collective exhale of over 200 racers who’d been holding their breath all morning. Some days had gales. Some days were wind holes so glassy that your own despair could be seen in the reflection. Tidal gates forced racers into a maritime game of Red Light, Green Light. And the Strait of Juan de Fuca tried to eat boats for breakfast, as usual.
The Winners
Team Puget Sound Navigation Company, blasted around the course aboard their eye-catching catamaran “Incognito” and across the finish line at 5:24 AM on July 1 to win The Wind Division. New record. New bragging rights.
Human power was as heroic as ever. Team Boogie Barge won The Muscle Group WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP BELT after cranking out a massive 1.5-day-lead over the next fastest human-powered team, Team Toad’s Wild Ride. Their official race review: “It’s a very impractical way to travel.”
The Odd, the Ingenious, and the Gutsy
Then there were the teams who kept WA360…different. Team Murder Cats from Mars started the race, stopped just feet over the starting line to finish rigging their boat, then restarted as a rowboat instead of a sailboat—because why not? Team Calorically Dense needed more human-powered gusto along the way and therefore built an oar out of a bilge floorboard and a spinnaker pole, refusing to let a little thing like propulsion stand in their way. Team Never Get Off The Boat got disqualified for firing up their engine near Watmough Bay, but grinned their way across the finish line anyway, because that’s how you do it. And Team Unicorns with Pretty Horns managed to hole their boat near Yellow Island, but eight-year-old wunderkind EmmyLou was back at Opti sailing camp the next day, undeterred and already plotting her WA360 return.
Community is the Secret Sauce
WA360 is far from just a race. It’s the 450-person race-celebrating breakfast in Port Townsend, fans obsessively tracking dots at 3 AM, and locals popping up on beaches with hot food, showers, and the occasional surprise pizza delivery. It’s the Community Boating Center in Bellingham that kept helping racers regroup and reload as they eyed the next jump to Point Roberts. It’s Martha, the marina manager in Point Roberts, who offered free moorage to racers and made that far corner of the course feel like home. It’s Heidi and Tor, who not only placed and maintained the turning mark up there but also charged trackers, shared their hot tub, and generally solved every problem racers could throw at them. It’s fans who showed up at all hours to cheer from beaches, solve racers’ logistical puzzles, and roar finish-line welcomes to boats of every size.
Wild, Wonderful
This was the race of wasp attacks, beach evictions, and philosophical debates about the futility of rowing 0.67 knots against current.
So here’s to all 84 teams who showed up at the start line. To the 55 finishers (and counting). To the 25 who didn’t finish but still have tales worth telling. To the youth teams who gave us hope. And to everyone who tracked the race, screamed at the tracker when it didn’t refresh fast enough, and made WA360 2025 unforgettable.
Next year, we at Northwest Maritime will again be wearing our R2AK hats, with WA360 on pause until 2027. Until then: keep building weird boats, keep pedaling when you can’t sail, and keep believing that more is always possible.
– Jesse Wiegel, Race Boss
Fresh Footage
Video by Taylor Amble, Header photo by Shanon Dell