May 08, 2009
Arlington Yacht Club Regatta- part II
Sunday at AYC showed the storms of Saturday had passed and we began racing on time.
At the start we had a close fleet. I was behind A.K. on Starboard tack with M.L. behind me and to leeward. I forget the details, but at some point during this time, I dove below A.K.'s transom, and M.L. was coming up. I heard him warning me, but I knew I had room and I made it through the opening between them, and started to luff A.K. Then I lost my nerve and stopped, focusing on getting speed up. In retrospect, I should have luffed him up over the line because I could have used that time.
At the leeward mark, I chose the right hand gate. A.K. was ahead, and took the left, as did M.L. I rounded the mark and realized I had not been watching for downwind boats, specifically Catalina-22's. I rounded on Starboard and came up against a boat. I hailed I was coming up, got a response that they couldn’t; there was another boat above them. For a second I was nonplussed and then I spoke my mind - "Well, make them go up!" He began talking to them, but by this time I realized it was too late. I bore away and gybed onto port, and came up close-hauled, below the gate mark. No justice here.
We tacked away and came back up on Starboard and continued to race. I could have protested, but to what end? No way to prove what I really lost, and having them DSQ'd wouldn't help me. (It's sort of the same way I feel about raising someone else's taxes; it does me no good.)
So, we worked our way up the course, managed to pass ML to get into 2nd and barely held him off for a downwind finish.
At this point we were in Second, but if we could beat A.K. we had a chance for first, but it was not to be. The third race turned out to be uneventful. We had a reasonable start, but we made some bad choices. And this time, M.L. caught us going downwind. I gybed at a bad time, and he got by.
Such was our fortune. Some really close races, a lot of fun, and some interesting times.
I have spent some time working on the video recorded on the first day. There's some interesting stuff. I will post it but not today.