RC=Dean/Greg Debois
After a quick RC protocol & motor refresher from Marcel and a gear & tackle rundown from Jeff, we headed out and I proceeded to promptly tangle up the line which I towed the large buoys with, first around the motor shaft, then around itself. Better planning on my part would've allowed us to start closer to on-time - not to mention getting out earlier.
It was a really nice night, a bit breezy from the southwest with a not-too-strong ebb, and a tad on the cool side. We had nine boats with David doubling up with Rich and Jorge with Chris T.
We managed six races and got 4 first placers (including the Olsons!). The line for the first race was way skewed towards the pin end. Marcel took advantage and port-tacked the fleet - which worked well until he had a course malfunction and pulled up early. Nick was the consistent one and took the night. The ebb led to a few individual recalls. Joel neglected to clear himself in Race 2, so got pushed back to 3rd for the night. We tweaked the line after Race 1 and ended up with boats starting at both ends. I set the course in deeper water (a bit inadvertently since the wind wasn't quite as south as I thought) which led to less tide relief shenanigans and made the upwind/downwind crossings less of an issue despite the building ebb.
The packs stayed very bunched up and made the finishes and mark roundings (one leeward rounding in particular) really tight. We used courses 1 through 5 and would've used more if we had set a reaching mark. We might have dumped an offset at the windwark mark, but seemed to be short an anchor. The downwind finishes took serious concentration to score since the sail numbers were hard to read and the finishes so close. There were at least a couple times where a well timed puff 50' from the finish bettered a boat's placement by a couple. |
