← WA360 Home ← 2025 WA360 Teams
Crew: Melanie Lyons, Katie Gaut, Stephanie Campbell, and Karen Gunn
Hometown: Bellingham, WA
Vessel: Santa Cruz 27
Class: The Wind Division
Get to know Team Salish Seasters
First thing first. Why race in WA360?
We just think this sounds like a whole lot of fun! Secondly, we want to put our grit to the test, challenge our sailing skills and experience the beauty of the Puget Sound with just enough friendly competition to keep us motivated. We look forward to long stints on the pedal drive, sleeplessness, varied weather and sea states, and the many unknowns along the way.
What’s your connection to these waters?
We hail from the Puget Sound area – Bellingham, Anacortes and Seattle. With deep respect and gratitude, we honor the original caretakers of the Salish Sea. In their honor, we seek to challenge both our physical and mental selves, as the Salish Coastal Tribal peoples have done since time immemorial.
Superpowers. Each crew member gets one. What are they and why?
We think our superpowers will present themselves somewhere between Budd Inlet and Point Roberts, but what we know so far is that Mel actually experiences a natural high at the prospect of complex logistics and problem solving in austere settings, Katie, R2AK veteran, has an authentic and infectiously cheerful optimism in the face of adversity, Stephanie, our human chart plotter and wind indicator, has special night sailing abilities and Karen, with her good-natured tenacity puts the fun in type 2 fun.
Defend your vessel choice for WA360. What makes it so cool and worthy?
Wild Card is a Santa Cruz 27. she’s as fast as she is stylish, and as an R2AK veteran, she has sailed and pedaled around the proverbial block more than once.
What are your adventure qualifications for WA360? What makes you (y’all) cool and capable?
We all have individual experience working and/or recreating in high-stakes and remote environments where risk analysis, mitigation, and contingency planning are critical. We also understand that success is always a team effort and that our shared goals, collective skills and individual strengths will see us through. As for being cool – no comment.
What is going to break?
She’s in pretty good shape, but it’s entirely possible that Wild Card might be hiding something until just the right moment. She is a bit of a wild card!