ON NARRAGANSETT BAY -- The sky is the clear blue of sea glass as a late-afternoon wind teases the surface of the Bay.

The blue sailboat Rogue cruises out of Wickford Harbor, passing a kayaker and docked sailboats as its crew unfolds sails and prepares for the night's race.

Skipper Jon St. Coeur, a retired Cranston firefighter, stands on deck as Thomas Warren, nicknamed the "navi-guesser," gives him the particulars -- tide, wind speed and direction, and the course around the Bay.

The Wednesday night races at the Wickford Yacht Club are just "beer-can racing," like a pickup game among friends. For nearly 20 summers, St. Coeur and his friends have made these evenings their great escape.

On land, the crew holds high-pressure jobs -- in firefighting, emergency management and medicine. But on the boat, a Taylor 38, the only things that matter are wind, water and sky.

For these few hours, cell phones are left below deck. Work pressures, family obligations, stay on shore.

This is where Tom Warren, a Providence battalion fire chief, says he finds peace. His younger brother Robert Warren, head of the state Emergency Management Agency, calls sailing his release.

"These Wednesday nights are sacred," says Steven Fera, a cardiologist who carves out time from his schedule at South County Cardiology.

The sailors on the other boats might be edgy about winning. On the 38-foot Rogue, there's a different philosophy.

"I win the race as soon as I step on the boat with my friends," St. Coeur says.

ST. COEUR learned to sail while growing up in Saunderstown and later was a sailing instructor and club steward at the Saunderstown Yacht Club.

"Sailing teaches discipline, self-reliance, character," he says, "because when you're out there, you're not at the top of the food chain. You're at the mercy of Mother Nature."

In the mid-1980s, he went from teaching children to teaching his friends, most of whom were firefighters and cops. St. Coeur had just bought his first racing sailboat, a Galaxy 32, and invited his friends to crew during the Wednesday night races in Wickford.

St. Coeur has known the Warren brothers since they volunteered as young men at the Tower Hill fire station in South Kingstown. Tom Warren later joined the Providence Fire Department, while St. Coeur and Bob Warren became firefighters in Cranston. St. Coeur also invited Cranston firefighters Jack Warburton and Mike "Mouse" Ostrander to join the crew. St. Coeur knew Fera from a second job in the cardiology department at South County Hospital.

The Galaxy 32, named the Adventure 3, was better at storing beer than racing, Fera said. That was just as well. "It was an adventure," St Coeur remembered. "These guys had never sailed before."

St. Coeur outgrew the Adventure 3 and another boat before finding the Rogue seven years ago. The semi-custom sailboat, one of just eight in the nation, raced first as the Argonaut and then the Caliente, garnering a string of IMS regatta wins. St. Coeur bought the sailboat and called it Rogue.

Some of the crew has changed over time. The newer sailors include St. Coeur's wife, Linda; Mark Stevens, the only active Cranston firefighter in the group; and Kent Dresser, president of Confident Captain/Ocean Pros, which provides boating instruction.

Newer members Laura Weindel, a nurse with Fera, and Megan McCarthy handle the bow -- an area St. Coeur calls "adventureland" because the women have to meet the demands from "fantasyland," the stern where St. Coeur and the other men decide the Rogue's next moves.

St. Coeur and his crew have never missed a Wednesday night race in 20 years.

They've raced the Rogue in the Block Island Race Week and placed third three times. They've won in Wickford numerous times. But they'd rather talk about other things than strategy: the on-board birthday parties, grilling sausages and peppers in the stern while racing, or when former crew member Ostrander got sick overboard between tacks.

After 20 years, St. Coeur's crew has gone from a "union boat" of Cranston firefighters and Providence cops to nearly all high-ranking chiefs and managers. Tom Warren is the only original member still on a fire department; Bob Warren and Warburton retired from Cranston and are now at the state Emergency Management Agency. St. Coeur retired as a firefighter and from echocardiology at South County Hospital and now works for Fera.

The original crew members were in their 30s when they began sailing; they're now in their 50s.

The Rogue, St. Coeur says, will be his last boat.

MINUTES BEFORE the race, the Rogue glides amid other boats in the middle of the Bay.

In the stern, Tom Warren holds a chart of the Bay and tells St. Coeur the course -- a six-mile upwind-downwind course down toward Fox Island and up to Quonset Point. Warburton relays the route to McCarthy and Weindel on the bow.

"Where's our competition?" St. Coeur asks.

"There's Renegade," Warren says. "Riptide," Warburton calls out. "White Heat," says McCarthy.

The sailboats circle until the start.

Within minutes, another boat comes at the Rogue off the starboard side. "Hold your course! Hold your course!" Tom Warren shouts at the other boat as the Rogue's crew scrambles to adjust the sails and St. Coeur steers out of the way. The other sailboat passes just behind the Rogue, close enough so the smiles on some of the opposing crews' faces are clear.

A fat-bellied plane flies over toward Quonset as the Rogue speeds at upwind 6.8 knots. Warburton yells that Renegade is higher in the water and faster. A stronger wind suddenly lifts the Rogue's sails, aiming the bow higher into the wind.

"Lift it! Lift it!" St. Coeur shouts as the Rogue reaches 6.9 knots. "Nice lift!"

As the Rogue heels, Bob Warren, Dresser and Stevens climb on the starboard rail, riding high as the port side skims the surface of the Bay.

The crew works in sync, knowing what to do, no hesitation. Some resemble the firefighters they once were, except now they are surrounded by water.

Other sailboats cut through the water before and behind them, but the Rogue crew's real competitor is time. The older boat has a two-minute, 40-second handicap to even out the field. Other sailboats might look as if they're leading, but the race is won by skill.

Downwind, the Rogue soars.

The headsail comes down as the great marine-blue and red spinnaker goes up, ballooning like a massive kite before the bow.

Bob Warren stands with the spinnaker line in his gloved hands, as if pulling the ropes on a parachute. His eyes follow the shoulders of the sail as the wind fills the spinnaker and powers the boat forward. The roar of the bow's wake tells him Rogue's speed.

"Pull back," he calls to Linda St. Coeur, who cranks in the line to the spinnaker pole, trying to capture more wind.

"Pull forward," he says moments later, and she eases the line a few inches.

The beauty of the Bay unfolds around the sailboat. The sun glitters off the water. Waves rush against the bow. All across the Bay, sailboats glide with multicolored spinnakers before them, like rainbow kites leading them by the nose. In the distance, the sun glints off the windshields of cars and trucks rushing over the Jamestown-Verrazano Bridge.

The Rogue picks up speed and flies. "I love it! I love it! I love it!" St. Coeur says, his words running together.

DURING A LAST neck-and-neck turn ahead of Renegade, the Rogue's crew struggles to raise the headsail, but it tangles. The other sailboat pulls ahead, eliminating Rogue's lead.

Disappointment hangs over Rogue's crew for a moment and then dissipates. The Rogue places third in its class, behind White Heat and Renegade, and ahead of Riptide, keeping third place for the season.

As they turn back, the crew passes around cans of beer and small bottles of wine. Tom Warren takes the wheel as St. Coeur pops open a beer and jumps up onto the deck.

"Hey, nice race everybody," he says. "That was a nice race."

There's something to see on any sailing trip. St. Coeur has seen nights when the countless stars seemed so low they looked as if they were dropping into the ocean, and days when bluefish in a feeding frenzy appeared to be boiling in the water.

On this midsummer night, they watch the red evening sun sink behind Wickford Harbor, lighting a golden path into the cove.

"Look at that sunset! Look at that!" St. Coeur says. "We can just follow the beam right in."

Boat specs

Make and model: 1984 Taylor 38

Length: 38 feet

Beam: 12 feet

Draft: 8 feet

Top speed: 14 knots

Sail number: USA 32815

Engine: Universal diesel engine, 30 HP

Sleeps: 8

Purchased: 1999

Cost: $200,000 new, now about $50,000

Best boating moment: "There are so many," Jon St. Coeur says. "The best time I have out there is any day those guys are out on the boat."

Worst boating moment: "I don't think I've ever had a bad time on the boat," he says. "Any day on the water is better than a day at work."

EXTRA: Browse previous stories in this series, find useful resources for mariners and share your boating adventures, at:

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amilkovi@projo.com / (401) 277-7213