Sailing Story: Jim Elser
If you’ve spent much time recreating on Flathead Lake, especially in the Yellow Bay area, you may have found yourself looking out on the water at quite an odd sight and asking yourself— is that a kayak, a sailboat… a mirage? Somewhat surprisingly, all of those answers would be correct.
That brightly colored boat on the water would be Flathead Lake Biological Station’s director, Jim Elser, out on his Hobie Mirage Tandem Island Trimaran. At least twice a week, you can find Jim out on Flathead Lake pedaling (if there’s no wind), sailing (in good wind), and in the summer months— enjoying a dip off the side of his two-person trimaran.
“It’s super fun because it’s a great platform for swimming. You can get out in the middle of the lake and swim,” Jim said about sailing his boat around Flathead Lake. “And if there is no wind, you can pedal!”
While Jim Elser says he has seen one other Hobie Trimaran out on Flathead Lake, we would bet our money on this one being the only of its kind helmed by a world-famous aquatic scientist. For Jim, his love of lake sciences and sailing are fairly intertwined and he can date his scientific interests all the way back to his childhood, when he first began sailing.
“The whole behavior of water, currents, and wind… you start taking note of that of a sailor and thinking of it scientifically,” he explained. “Now as a scientist I’m able to describe those things– like the lines of foam in the water.”
Jim studies nutrient dynamics on lakes, including Flathead, and recently published a paper summarizing 40+ years of nutrient dynamics and water quality in Flathead Lake. It’s the perfect job for a water lover like Jim.
“When I was a kid I was always kind of messing around in the water. We were always out there building dams and catching turtles,” Jim said. At age 12, he was recruited to join a local yacht club and that’s where his sailing journey began.
“They weren’t really yachts, they were Snipes,” Jim said. “In high school my brother and I raced together and when he went off to college I took over as captain.”
After high school, Jim didn’t sail much — until he moved to Flathead Lake for work. He then serendipitously found his Hobie Trimaran in a local sports store in Kalispell.
For the past seven or eight years, Jim has regularly taken his Hobie out and even makes the journey across the length of the lake twice a year on his little sailboat. As for the larger sailboats, that’s something Jim has only ever watched from afar.
“We go over to Dayton with our paddling kayaks to paddle over to Wild Horse Island,” he said. “Then I see the operation and the sailboats.”
However, 2025 will be the year that changes! Instead of spotting Jim out on the water in his two-person sailboat, you may well see him taking in the beauty of the lake from a Capri 22 with Go Sail Flathead Lake and his co-workers at Flathead Lake Biological Station.
“I’m excited about learning if I really don’t know how to sail and seeing how that works on a larger boat,” Jim laughed about his feelings on taking a VIP cruise of Flathead Lake with Go Sail Flathead Lake.
While we are sure Jim will find the two types of boats to be quite similar— maybe we’ll find ourselves with a sailing update from Jim down the road as he realizes just how much more sailing knowledge he could learn in ASA courses with Go Sail Flathead Lake!