Okay, so a cobweb or two still requires removal at the MBYC Feb Regatta

February 13, 2005

 

After days of rain and grey the sun finally came out (sort of) and the 8 brave souls from the 505 fleet had some good racing in great conditions on Sunday. Welcome back to Bill McKinney sailing with Mike Pollard on the newly refinished and great looking Road Kill. It is also rumored that Bill has a project in the works to get Fever sailing again -- awesome.

After discussion and voting during the week -- we all left the dock believing that we would be sailing W/L and triangles with SCRA and found that the SCRA powers that be made the decision to sail the MBYC races -- somebody please help me figure out why I joined SCRA this season? Kind of ironic that Gary got his wish to sail the MBYC races but did not have a course chart (see below). We were lucky to have a course chart with us -- I think we were the only ones.

Anyway, Karl and I left the dock a bit early to get some practice in. On our first hoist, next thing I know Karl comes flying backwards and nearly knocks me out the back of the boat -- luckily (for me) the main sheet block slowed his fall -- ouch. After helping Karl get back to his feet I realized that the spinnaker launcher line had broken right at the white plastic ball. Back to the dock to play with tools and such.

Missed the first race while we fixed the problems. It looked like the first race was TAZ, Don't Pinch, Bollocks.

Next race started in about 8 knots of breeze. A couple close crosses with Gary on Taz to the first mark. It turned out that Gary (with no course chart aboard) decided to round a different mark close to the right mark. Anyway, close racing the rest of the way around, with TGIF, Don't Pinch then Road Kill.

Now that we all had the course figured out, we started the third race with three boats on the line. Don't Pinch headed in early and was not spotted in the bar after racing - very uncharacteristic and hopefully nothing serious. (ed. note: Can't let this one go... We did in fact guzzle a bit of rum after putting Pinch away, but decided to extricate before things got too intense... for once!)

Started the third race with probably 10-12 knots of steady breeze and had a close first beat with TAZ. Next thing I know TAZ was headed in. Turns out that Gary's crew, Gary Jr., missed the trap wire and went for a swim in the frigid Mission Bay and they headed in. Two boats finished the third race with TGIF slightly ahead of RoadKill. Karl and I did a few wire reaches with the chute across the bay -- Mission Bay can get pretty small in a 505.

I went home feeling good about several wise decisions in my life: buying a 505 and moving to San Diego (no blast reaching in February in Philadelphia)

Hope those of you traveling up to ABYC have a great time.

See you all out at our first FC regatta on Feb 27th at MBYC.

- Channing