Competitive Sailing Stereotype Doesn’t Apply to : SMYTH and GLASER, : A Pair of Catamaran Racers Who Know Better : And for Their Next Adventure, Duo Will Venture Across the Pacific to Honolulu

Mention competitive sailing and the first thing that comes to mind is the image of the America’s Cup where a crew in topsiders and fishing caps do their best not to get wet in between drinking bottles of Dom Perignon.

Mention that to Randy Smyth, competitive sailor, and he laughs heartily, because he knows that in his business, nothing could be further from the truth.

Sailing does have its advantages for Smyth and his partner, Jay Glaser--world travel, breakfast with President Reagan after last year’s Olympics--but Smyth makes it clear that hard work is the order of the day and theirs is definitely a hands-on sport.

Recently, for example, Smyth and Glaser sailed in the Worell 1,000, a race covering 1,000 of miles from Fort Lauderdale, Fla., to Virginia Beach, Va. The race began on May 21, ended June 2, and when it was over, Smyth and Glaser had won the race of small catamarans (20 feet long and shorter), beating the nearest team by almost five hours.

A catamaran is a small vessel with two parallel hulls about the size of canoes that share a common sail in the middle. So they not only work hard to keep the craft upright, but they get wet along the way as well.

“The pictures capture the glory of it all,” Smyth points out with a sweep of his hand at his office in Huntington Beach, “but actually we’re just water rats. Sometimes we’re out on the water for 16 hours at a time.”

Smyth’s office is in the front of his sail-making operation, a small factory and warehouse that specializes in making sails for all types of craft. On the walls are an assortment of color pictures that do make the sport seem more glamorous than it might actually be.

“In a way, sailing is like driving for 16 straight hours except that in sailing, when you’re exhausted, there’s no way to stop and take a break,” Smyth said.

When sailing catamarans, Smyth, the captain, and Glaser, the crew, are suspended over the side of the craft in a trapeze harness, using their own weight to balance the thrust of the wind that their sail is catching.

“It’s a small boat,” Smyth said. “It’s only about one foot out of the water at any time.”

Depending on the wind, then, a catamaran can easily capsize, something that their Prindle-19 did once during that Worrell 1,000 race.

But what worries sailors such as Smyth and Glaser is not necessarily losing valuable time to opponents facing the same problems. Rather, the big danger in that race was running across sea turtles, jellyfish and sharks.

Smyth explained the inherent dangers of each.

Sea turtles: “The giant sea turtles can weigh up to a couple of hundred pounds and you can’t see them in the dark. It’s like hitting a rock. Our catamaran has a secondary bulkhead--just like the Titanic had.”

Jellyfish: “One or two won’t bother you but if you sail through a bunch of them, they can jam up your rudder. They look like cabbage heads.”

Sharks: “After the race, they said that a hammerhead shark as big as our boat swam between our hulls. Supposedly up to 100 sharks were in our area at one time (the media observed the race from the air), but we didn’t see any the time we tipped over.”

And there was race strategy to consider.

“We didn’t really expect to win,” Smyth said, “because this was our first time racing in the unlimited (any-sized sail) catamarans. But we did all kinds of weather research beforehand, such as the southeasterly trade winds and how it got cooler as you go north.

“So we used a sail that we thought would work best. In this case, bigger was not necessarily better.”

After sailing an average of 80 to 90 miles per day in the race, Smyth and Glaser would beach their craft at a predesignated spot, have their day’s time recorded, and then be attended to by their “ground crew,” loyal assistants who travel the eastern seaboard paralleling their course with repair equipment and supplies.

A ground crew is one luxury they won’t have on their next adventure, the TransPacific Race from Los Angeles to Honolulu, beginning July 4. On that occasion, they’ll be sailing a 70-footer with a crew of four to keep the weight light.

“We’re going to try to break the record,” Smyth said, “so we’ll have a small beacon onboard that sends a signal to Argos, a French communications satellite. The satellite will send a message to a ground station in Arizona, and they’ll relay our time and distance right back to my office.”

That’s so they’ll have scientific proof in case they do break the record of 7 1/2 days in the event, but more importantly the beacon can also send a distress signal if they run into trouble in the middle of the Pacific.

Smyth isn’t anticipating trouble there, but one can’t really be too sure, especially in the open sea. If anything, Smyth and Glaser have had unusually good luck in their ocean adventures.

The team won a silver medal in the Tornado catamarans at last summer’s Olympics and their sailing has taken them to such diverse places as Australia, Chile, Brazil, England, West Germany, France, Italy, Holland and Abu Dhabi, a city in the United Arab Emirates on the Persian Gulf.

Smyth’s most memorable experience came in Holland, when after wandering around the coastal town of Enkhuisen in an African native outfit (and sunglasses) that he’d bought in Morocco, the local police arrested him because he looked, well, suspicious.

They let him go after he explained, in part, that he was an American in town for the local sailing competition.

Such experiences seem to be the best education of all for Smyth, 30, a graduate of Marina High School, and his partner, Glaser, 31, a Westchester High graduate.

The upcoming World Championships at Travemunde, for example, is on the Baltic Sea near the West and East German borders.

Said Smythe: “On one side is barbed wire and on the other, topless bikinis. You don’t have to guess which is which.”