Frostbiting Out of Breakwater Yacht Club, A Different Kind of Sailing

Grab your drysuits, fleece pullovers and battery-powered socks, it’s time to go frostbiting!

While it may not sound all that enticing to some people, sailing during the winter months in Sag Harbor is not only the best way to sail, for some it’s the only way to sail. There is a strong, competitive and continuously growing number of sailors who are sailing out of Breakwater Yacht Club in Sag Harbor just about every Sunday, when the weather isn’t too crazy, and for many of them, they wouldn’t have it any other way.

While he recommends drysuits for the chance that someone may go overboard in some rough conditions, Nick Gazzolo says frostbiting is just like any other sport played outdoors in the chillier fall and winter months — as long as you prepare the right way, it’s really not so bad. Fleece pullovers may be worn but aren’t necessarily a requirement for all. Neither are those battery-powered socks.

“Everyone wears a drysuit because that’s what you do to be safe, and we always want to be safe out there on the water. The battery-powered socks, they’re really not needed. If someone has poor circulation in their feet and they always get cold, then you can get them, but you don’t need them,” Gazzolo explained. “But we always have someone on a motor boat as part of the race committee which helps sets up the courses, the starts and finishes.

“Afterward, we go into the clubhouse and have wine and cheese, hang out for a bit by the fireplace. It’s sort of like an ‘après-ski’ lounge,” he continued. “There’s a good mix of young and old. Many of us have been sailing together with one person or another for more than a decade. It’s just fun because of the rhythm of the seasons and the way they are, July and August and how crazy it gets, sailing this time of year there’s literally no boats on the water, so racing behind Breakwater now is actually some of the best sailing of the year.”

While all of the sailors like a good challenge, there are times, like this past Sunday, when it was windier than normal, where they will call the sailing off.

“It’s really just to have a wonderful day out on the water, to clear your head, get away from screens we look at,” Gazzolo added. “It can be a real tonic to be able to do that with friends and also keep sailing 12 months out of the year.”

Scott Sandell explained that he first came across frostbiting when he was 10 years old and he and his family traveled to Chicago for Thanksgiving, where they stayed in a highrise above Lake Michigan. When he looked out on the harbor he saw multiple dinghies.

“Sailing? On Thanksgiving?” Sandell recalled. “Then I thought about it, ‘Well, why can’t you sail now?’

“Being curious enough back then, I researched it and found that frostbiting on the East Coast was really a big thing. It made sailing a year-round thing and it really turned my life around,” Sandell said.

“I would rather sail in the winter than the summer,” he added.

Sandell, a sail maker himself, found that there was a group called the “Cape Cod Frosties.” He also referred to a documentary on YouTube called “Frostbiters” which he recommended everyone go see to get a full sense of what it could be like.

Gloria Frazee is the current commodore of Breakwater’s sunfish and rocket group — the group sails sunfish, rockets, which are a newer class of boats, and lasers. She said one of the things she loves about it is the eclectic group that it is. There are people from Montauk to Shoreham-Wading River, and all over, who come to join their group, and it’s people of all ages and professions — a high school student, a book binder, and the list goes on.

While sailing is at the heart of what they do, Frazee said, it’s more than that.

“We’ve all been to each other’s homes, so there’s definitely a camaraderie within the group, and the one thing that we’re really big at is bringing along less experienced sailors. We have some club boats that people can use if they don’t have their own, and we’re all willing to give everyone pointers.

“Breakwater is such a fabulous club to belong to because it really is community sailing, and this so happens to be in the winter,” she added.

Joan Butler has been a part of the group for a while now and said that frostbiting is simply fun.

“Being out on the water sailing, once you leave shore, what’s on shore is left on shore,” she said. “Sailing really brings you into the moment and sharing that with nice and fun people, that’s why we keep coming back. Then you come back to shore and everything is all good.”