Surprise's Log Day Sailer 11750

April Series #3

This was the last time I made it out on the water for a wednesday night race. since then the winds have been too strong. Last week we have 25 with gusts to 30. ditto the week before.
With any luck this unlucky trend will be broken tonight.

Southwestern regionals

It's actually tough for me to write this entry since for me it always seems to be bad form to blow your own horn.
In short, Kathy and I won the Southwestern regionals, after some tough competition with the folks in Arlington.
It was great to see Michael and Brooks from California there; they visited us on their way to do volunteer work in Mississippi.

It was great to see Lloyd, Manuel, Chuck, Andy and Linda, Sammy, Kevin , Marshall, Bill and all the other great folks at the Arlington Yacht Club.

Some of the memorable points in the races:
We were sailing downwind in the second race, in a pack with Andy, Manuel and Kevin. We were all on port tack, sailing deep. I was to leeward of Manuel and to windward of Andy and Kevin. We took a wind shift, tacked to starboard, and got to the starboard side of Andy and Kevin. The wind increased and hit us first and our boat accelerated out in front. We were able to hold that lead until we rounded the weather mark.

It came down to the last race between Andy and me. So Andy kept close to us at the start. We fell pretty far behind, and we were resigned to not beating Andy, he was so far ahead at one point in time. Kevin was ahead of Andy, but was solidly in 4th place for the regatta. On the last upwind, we sailed to the left side of the course, and got hit with a large header. We tacked and found ourselves just under the layline. The wind strengthened and the boat sailed fast toward the mark. At the mark, Andy had been in a hole and we squeaked in between him and a Catalina-22. On the down wind, Andy had better wind and passed us, with Kevin finishing ahead of both of us. It was sheer luck that we found that wind shift. I never saw it coming.

I had assumed that Andy won the regatta, but I had not considered the throwout. We discarded a 4, Andy a 3. That brought us to the same score, and since I had two firsts, as opposed to one for Andy, the Southwestern Regionals fell to me. I was amazed, and happy to take the heavy perpertual trophy back home.

Lloyd and Kevin sailed without their spinnakers most of the regatta, and did pretty well.