As I Saw It (and remembered it!)

This week we welcomed Geoff Dews to the fleet for his first race of the year in Blindside Bludging, giving us 6 boats with all the usual starters minus Knot Easy. Al helped out Geoff on the foredeck while on Athena Brad stepped up to drive as Helen was still way. The Saint has a scratch crew with Martie pulling a last minute sickie and Ange stepping in for both Fiona and Sophie. Smithy managed to grab a 3^rd when approached by cruising sailor Steve who was looking for an Etchells experience. From what I hear, for someone with little racing experience and no kite experience he did a sterling effort.

Race 1 started in 8-10 kts from the north. Rapscallion and Athena jockeyed for the pin end of the line with the others spaced along the line above them. As the fleet slowly peeled off to the right Athena and Rapscallion who went furthest left benefitted the most. Athena had a handy 4-5 length lead at the top from Rapscallion who tacked just in front of The Saint as they rounded 2^nd and 3^rd. Just a length back was Waterloo Too followed by the Project and Blindside Bludging.

An early gybe on Rapscallion saw them gain on Athena on the run to round the bottom 2 lengths ahead. By this stage The Saint and W2 were side by side as they rounded the bottom gate.

For the final beat the breeze had gone right by 20 degrees which took away any attacking opportunities and Rapscallion covered Athena off the bottom and then forced them to follow as they sailed up the port lay-line. The Saint and W2 were in a tight battle with W2 dominating to round the top in 3^rd.  A procession to the finish meant those were the final positions.

The breeze started to build during the last run and with a forecast of a building breeze for the rest of the day a few of the boats did jib changes. One of these was Rapscallion, who’s bowman made a rookie error that saw the jib halyard disappear to the top of the mast (no names shall be mentioned 😊), which meant that at each rounding the spinnaker halyard was swapped between the jib and kite – bugger! Definitely not quick!

For race 2 the course was shifted 30 degrees right. Scottie materialised out of nowhere to jump on to The Saint and take the helm for this race. Again, we saw Athena and Rapscallion battle at the lower end of the line with some yelling of keep up and “protest” in the final seconds as Heals tried to stop Bradley from sailing down on him. Who was right and wrong can be debated until the cows come home but the outcome was a poor start for Rapscallion who were stuck underneath Athena before tacking off to the right. The Saint who tangling with Athena 30 seconds out managed to get a clean start on port dipping several of the starboard starters.

The first beat was slightly left favoured, though the Saint who went right off the start before going back left were first around just a length ahead of Athena who came in on the port layline. 3^rd was Waterloo Too ahead of The Project with Rapscallion rounding 5^th a further length back with Blindside Bludging 6^th.

An early gybe by W2 saw them sail down the inside to round the left gate a length ahead of Athena and The Saint who rounded the right gate in a tight battle that was to last the rest of the race with Scottie and Bradley determined to beat each other. Rapscallion managed to ease past The Project to be 4^th at the bottom.

The final beat saw W2 go hard right and at one point look in all sorts of trouble compared to on those on the left ,but the second half of the beat saw them get a favourable shift to have a comfortable lead at the top. The Saint who didn’t go as far right as W2 came together at top just behind Athena who had gone left. The Project and Rapscallion traded tacks most of the way up the top to see Rapscallion round in 4^th just a boat length a head though they lost that margin as they swapped halyards rounding the mark.

With W2 clear ahead on the run, Athena and The Saint battled it out all the way down the final leg. As they approached the final gate mark there were accusations of failing to keep clear – anyone notice a theme here? With Athena holding the inside line they managed to prevail by 4 seconds for their second 2^nd of the day.  The Project and Rapscallion were locked in their own battle with Rapscallion on the inside holding out The Project at the final gybe into the finish. Rapscallion holds on to cross 4^th by just a second and see an end to their 6 straight winning streak.

Boat of the day honours shared between Waterloo Too and Athena.

See you all next week.

(The author accepts no responsibilities for any inaccuracies, distortions of the truth or outright lies.)