It was a grand day for a sailboat race and 9 boats were testing the wind before the 1200 start. It was one
of those days when you know you should reef the main before the start but you do not see anyone else
doing so and you keep it all up. At the gun, JJ FLASH was well away with her cast of thousands and
managed surprisingly well to hang onto her very large
main. By Second Sister WESTWIND and SOUL
DANCER had put a reef in the main and ELECTRA had caught up with the fleet having been caught on
the wrong side of the start line at 1200.
Phil Hume with YEOMAN elected an anti-clockwise rounding of Prevost and
parted company with the rest
of the fleet. At Peile Point there appeared to be
lots of wind coming out of Navy Channel so ALACRITY
put a reef in the main and
eventually a couple of rolls in the headsail as well. Despite coming out of the
east it appeared to be WESTWIND’s wind. She stormed down the backside of Prevost with
her new
153% headsail looking quite
grand. (Watch for a significant rating change). ELECTRA and ALACRITY
were ducking it out at close
range when something let go on ELECTRA forcing a quick tack on both
boats. ALACRITY was caught with her headsail on the wrong side and managed
a quick test of the
cockpit drains while dead in
the water. Pity.
At Portlock Point the race
order after JJ FLASH (who was over
the horizon) was WESTWIND, SOUL
DANCER, ALACRITY and ELECTRA.
We also crossed paths with YEOMAN
off the point. The wind had
veered a little but still
allowed a single tack down Swanson Channel. On ALACRITY there was some
debate about the wisdom of
flying the chute on the homeward leg but it went up off the Ackland Islands
creating a further test of
the cockpit drains in the process. Once up and running we were holding better
than eight knots and almost
saw nine as the ferry boat wake passed under us. Both SOUL DANCER and
WESTWIND realised they needed a chute to stay in the race with
the latter being more successful in this
endeavor than the former. We
also noted YEOMAN broaching her
way through Captain Passage.
MADRIGAL broke some gear off the Sisters and retired. I wish I
could say more about CLASSY LADY
and ORACLE. We saw them both on the backside of Prevost going
well but I think it was on this leg that
the larger boats pulled away.
When the rain came in about 1400 it killed the wind making for a slow run in
for these two boats, which we
were delighted to see out, and we hope they enjoyed themselves.
Needless to say the Flash
took line honors by a substantial margin and was also kind enough to take the
times for the rest of us. WESTWIND held off ALACRITY and ELECTRA
was not able to make up any
distance on the homeward leg.
Results, time on time:
|
BOAT |
SKIPPER |
RTG |
ELAPSED |
CORRECTED |
POINTS |
|
JJ FLASH |
Farson |
55 |
2 07 14 |
2 23 50 |
100 |
|
ALACRITY |
Jones |
144 |
2 32 09 |
2 28 57 |
89 |
|
WESTWIND |
Andersen |
140 |
2 31 36 |
2 29 18 |
78 |
|
ELECTRA |
Kibble |
141 |
2 34 14 |
2 31 40 |
67 |
|
YEOMAN |
Hume |
132 |
2 38 38 |
2 38 09 |
56 |
|
SOUL DANCER |
Simpson |
128 |
2 40 04 |
2 40 34 |
44 |
|
CLASSY LADY |
Wellingham |
206 |
3 20 15 |
2 59 17 |
33 |
|
ORACLE |
Emmerson |
243 |
4 09 35 |
3 32 37 |
22 |
|
MADRIGAL |
Zapf |
231 |
DNF |
- |
11 |
The Portland Morsby race is
next weekend the 17th, with a 1000 start. My apologies to those who I
advised it to be the
following weekend. Also the second of the single-handed seminars is Tuesday 19th
at
1900 in the clubhouse. Topics
include spinnaker handling and self-steering. After the above adventure
there is at least three of us
who could use some help in the first subject.
Bob Jones,
ALACRITY