UPCOMING:
It’s Building Season!
4LIYC Meeting : November 2025
4LIYC Shipstore: Order custom iceboat shirts, hats, and gear. More information.
BURGEE: Order your 4LIYC Burgee
Pay Your Dues Online
Kansas City Here We Come
Iceboats are being pulled out of the rafters around North America. This Faceboook video with some bonafide Hollywood Ice© is from Bill Dwyer in Lake Lotawana, Missouri, a suburb of Kansas City. How much farther south can ice be found?
Looking Back While We Wait

From the University of Wisconsin Digital Collections: “Lake Mendota ice rink” Photographer: Meuer, William Date: 1919-02 ,
While we wait for the Great Zamboni and for the big Wisconsin lakes of Green and Geneva to come online, enjoy these images Peter Fauerbach found in the University of Wisconsin Digital Collection.
The forecast looks encouraging for iceboating in Wisconsin.
4LIYC Racing Update for Jan 6-7: No Racing

From better days on Lake Mendota. Shown here in February 1979 from left to right are 4LIYC members:Don Ermer, Don Sanford, Steve Arnold,Ty Reed, and Ken Kreider. The Statue of Liberty appeared in the middle of the night as part of a University of Wisconsin’s student campaign promise to bring the statue to Madison.
There will be no 4LIYC racing for January 6-7, 2018. The 1 1/2″ drifts on Lake Mendota have hardened making conditions too marginal for racing. However, some skippers will set up and try to sail and tune their boats on Sunday, January 7 out of Captain Bill’s launch.
In The News: Iceboating Southern Style
January’s deep freeze has been a boon to iceboating around the country in areas that haven’t seen sailable ice for several years. Our friends in Illinois are taking advantage of their conditions.
What wind chill? Ice boaters set sail on Lake Decatur
DECATUR — While Wednesday’s frigid temperatures kept many indoors, a quartet of ice boaters set out to take advantage of what the frozen Lake Decatur had to offer.They had a good time, according to expert boater Pete Johns, but the snow sitting on top of the lake made the conditions less than ideal. Continue reading.
4LIYC Racing Update for Jan 6-7
The 4LIYC will check ice on Friday, January 5 at noon. Please meet at Captain Bill’s.
Saturday morning racing might be out due to low temperatures and light winds, however we may be able to sail Saturday afternoon. Sunday looks even better with winds forecasted at 10-15 mph and tropical 31F temperatures. As of today, NOAA is calling for a “Chance Snow then Slight Chance Wintry Mix” for Sunday.
Commodore Don Anderson set up his Renegade yesterday on Middleton Bay. The snow was just too sticky for him to get going in the light air but Jerry Simon saw a Nite sailing on Mendoter “with no trouble, enough wind and not too much snow…. The Nite likely came from a home on the north side of the lake and [I] wasn’t able to talk to skipper. The 1-2 inches of light snow didn’t have any noticeable drifting with smooth hard ice underneath.”
Next update about 4LIYC racing will be Friday, January 5 by 5 PM.
Throw Back Thursday: The Day ROSEMARY Tipped Over
Many thanks to stern-steerer skipper Michael Kroll for posting a link to Andy Gratton’s story from this website on his Facebook page. Andy’s story about the legendary Oshkosh stern-steerer skipper, Don Ward, gets better with every reading. Michael writes, “I have read it many times, and when I see it, I can’t help but read it again because I’ve been in the back cockpit of this iceboat.”
The Day Rosemary Tipped Over.
© 2009 Andy Gratton
The 1992 NWIYA race was called on for Oshkosh. We had beautiful hard ice, except for
the typical crack in the bay. Nubs Salzsieder and I were discussing the upcoming
weekend, who was coming, etc. The usual plan for hard ice was that I would sail the
Timber Boat and he would sail Rosemary IV. We talked more about the boats, how Don
Ward had built so many, including the Rosemary boats, and how Don was always
interested in what was going on in Oshkosh, his home town. So Nubs called Don Ward
and told him to get on a plane and get back here from Washington State so he can sail on
his home ice. We didn’t really expect Don to do that, but a day or two later Nubs
informed me that Don would be sailing his old boat, Rosemary IV, and Nubs would be
sailing the Timber Boat. I was bummed because I had no other boat to race, so instead I
would help wherever needed.
read more…
Skeeters – At The Front
What an impressive shot for Harken’s monthly digest showcasing Steve Orlebeke’s Class A Skeeter, HONEYBUCKET and Paul Krueger’s RAMBL’N sailing on Lake Monona, Madison, Wisconsin.
Steve Orlebeke’s Perspective Looking Ahead
“I’m looking out my door onto the engineering section in the Pewaukee Harken offices. It’s almost the end of 2017 and a logical time to look ahead toward next year.” Continue reading.
Geneva Ice Watch
Happy New Year from the frozen tundra of Madison, WI where the temperature has climbed from -14F to -12F since the sun came up. Most of the area webcams haven’t been functional because of the cold except for Gordy’s on Geneva Lake. You can watch Geneva turn to ice by going to Gordy’s website and clicking on the webcam link on the top right of the page.
2018 WSSA Regatta Update
Via Andy Gratton, WSSA Secretary:
Happy New Years, iceboaters!
The Wisconsin Stern Steering Association regatta has been postponed to January 13 and 14. The next update will be Sunday, January 7. Check back here or call the Iceboat Hotline 608-204-9876. Lake Winnebago has more than 12″ of ice but the snow drifts are rock hard.
Pictures of the Year
The fine folks at the Toledo Ice Yacht Club were out in force yesterday on Maumee Bay. Wayne Mckinney was there and shot these eye catching photos. That’s the KAY E BARKER, an 11,948 ton “bulk discharging carrier.” But wait, that’s not just any Great Lakes Freighter, she’s captained by none other than Eric Sawyer, who also skippers the Class A stern steerer, MICHIGANDER.
UPDATE: Yes, according to Eric’s dad, Chip, he was at the helm yesterday and that “he watched the boats sailing as he entered Toledo.”