Sailing the clear blue skies has mechanical engineering alum Larry Elkin navigating a world-class amateur racing yacht to victory in the open waters off south Florida’s coastline–matching his highly competitive nature and Rose-Hulman-honed calculations with a longtime love of sailing to achieve one of his lifetime personal goals.

In late February, Elkin helped the BluePRINT Racing team capture first-place honors among its class in the Southern Ocean Racing Conference’s prestigious Nassau Cup Regatta, a race covering 170 nautical miles from the entrance of Miami Habor to Bahamas’ Nassau Harbor. This came after finishing second in races this racing season from Fort Lauderdale to Key West, Miami to Palm Beach, and a circular course near Fort Lauderdale.

“Yacht racing gives me the enjoyment of being part of a team. I love the physical challenge, and it motivates me to stay in excellent condition. However, I absolutely love applying my engineering skills,” he said.

When back on shore, Elkin owns two consulting firms. Elkin Engineering & Diagnostics is a forensic mechanical and structural engineering company located in Charleston, South Carolina. Meanwhile, ABS Environmental provides indoor air quality consulting services primarily associated with asbestos, lead, mold, and volatile organic compounds. Both entities assist clients with identifying the root causes of failures and help develop solutions. In addition, scientific investigations are provided for the insurance and legal markets.

Living in a coastal location gave Elkin easy access to the ocean and he admits that a life-changing event several years ago created a bucket list of future personal goals. One of the items was to “go so far out in the ocean that I couldn’t see land.”

“Sailing far out at sea, especially at night, is magical,” he stated. “The sky almost looks gray because there are so many visible stars. The Milky Way stretches from horizon to horizon. You can see every passing satellite, every shooting star, and the planets.” 

As BluePRINT’s yachting navigator and team co-sponsor, Elkin takes each course’s coordinates, weather forecasts, information about ever-changing winds, currents, and tides to create computer model simulations that develop a strategic game plan that completes the race in the shortest amount of time. He acknowledges that the strategy seeks to capitalize on the strengths, while avoiding any weaknesses, within the boat and its nine-member crew.

Elkin credits the skills and drive to succeed instilled by Rose-Hulman (earning a bachelor’s degree in 1991 and a master’s degree in 1993) for allowing him to pursue both his engineering career and sailing competition endeavors, which started six years ago. Differential equations and numerical analysis knowledge are assisting in producing race models. Meanwhile, numerical analysis is helping the team select proper sails to take advantage of racing conditions, and aerodynamics skills are helping optimize the trimming of sails.

“The skill and drive for excellence instilled by my Rose-Hulman education has its fingerprints all over my participation in yacht racing,” Elkin remarked. “My education has allowed me to be in a comfortable financial position so that I can enjoy the sport. Consider it ‘the justification for higher education.’”