CREW
Foredeck - Kathleen
Main Sheet & Timing - Pam
Jib Winches - Steve & Ben
Steering - Ron
Yes, we were short one so Kathleen was all alone on the foredeck. We added Ben Angus to the crew when his ABYC ride didn't materialize and put him on a winch. Welcome aboard Ben!
WIND
There wasn't much. We motored from QCYC with the main up. No temptation to sail. But prior to the first race it filled in a little bit from the west. It was actually reading almost 10 knots at the mast head but didn't feel that strong at deck level. That was a pattern that persisted through the day. In fact, at one point the mast head wind direction was 180 degrees to the deck level winds pushing the sails. Very confusing.
THE RACES
Race 1
The race instructions called for a 2x around windward/ leeward course with an offset mark at the windward end and double gate gybe marks. It was intended to get in three races, The course was a mile off ABYC east of the spit. Circe was in the non flying sails PHRF 2 fleet with boats 170 and faster. Ours was the second start. Our race committee was our own Graham Dougal in QCYC's Freddie M. There was just enough wind that Graham decided to start the sequence at the scheduled 10:40 time.
Turns out there were 9 boats in our division, 6 of them from QCYC; in addition to Circe there was Alpha Omega, Amelia, Initram, Ascend., and our Commodore's Tartan 37, Wild Jasmine, The other three was our old nemesis, Wee Beastie III, a J33 from Highland YC, Midnight Express, an Express 30 also from Highland, and Double Time a C&C 34 from ABYC. Veloce decided to sail in PHRF Flying Sails so was not in our division.
We decided not to believe the masthead wind strength and went with the light #1 based on the lighter deck level wind.
We had an OK start near the middle of the line but ended up trapped with boats behind and to weather and then Midnight Express sailed over us slowing us further. When boats behind either tacked over or could be cleared we tacked away on to port and headed northward toward the shore. Alpha and Midnight carried on starboard into the lake.
We tacked back on to starboard for the layline but from a long distance. As we got closer Alpha crossed us by about 5 lengths and Midnight tacked just ahead to weather. We were again in her dirt and any hope of laying the mark was done. We threw in two quick tacks to lay the mark and the started to look for the offset mark. We saw it where it should have been but inside the mark boat. Most boats ahead ignored it and headed immediately downwind. Midnight Express just ahead of us headed for the offset mark/boat and we followed. Than the mark boat seeing this decided to bugger off, still with the mark, so we decided too late that there was now no offset mark and after losing valuable distance to those ahead headed for the gybed mark. The run was uneventful and we, with most everyone else, gybed around the starboard mark which appeared significantly closer than the port.
We did better on the second buck and closed the distance on Alpha Omega and got ahead of Midnight Express. On the final run in a dying breeze we stayed ahead of Midnight Express but could not catch Alpha.
Race 2
There was a delay as Graham waited for the wind to fill in. The wind came up enough that we descended to switch to the heavy #1 and had it up long enough to scare the wind away and switched back to the light #1 soon after. We put a big dent in Kathleen's Custard Tarts and Steve's Granada chocolate as we drifted around.
There was a slight wind, still out of the west, so Graham decided to start a race. We started this time with better clear air and hung on to starboard tack further into the late. Alpha was to leeward. It looked like Wee Beastie had mistimed the start or were having problems as they were well behind the start line. We were having good speed and tacked over to port, short of the lay line. Alpha carried on. As we headed back into shore the wind started to lighten further but we looked like we were in great shape, ahead of boats to starboard who had tacked in sooner and ahead of boats that had carried further into the lake. In fact, it looked like we were leading the fleet.
Then they cancelled the race. Bugger!
We hung around another hour or so waiting for wind. We ate Pam's great sandwiches for lunch., put an even deeper dent in Steve's chocolate and generally lounged around. The wind never came and they finally called it a day at about 2:30. We all motored into ABYC.
THE RESULTS
Race 1
Wee Beastie, the scratch boat in our fleet with a 108 PHRF rating, finished well ahead of everyone and held her rating to finish 1st, 2:02 ahead of us on corrected time. We did not beat Midnight Express by enough to save her rating of 168 and she finished 2nd on corrected time, only 42 seconds ahead of us. Alpha finished 44 seconds ahead of us on elapsed time, enough to save her 149 rating to finish 38 seconds ahead of us on corrected time. Circe finished 4th with Double Time 5th, Ascend 6th, Amelia 7th, Initram 8th, and Wild Jasmine with a DNS due to a winch failure.
POST RACE
We were assigned a good mooring at ABYC and tied up and headed up to the club. We were in so early that nothing was ready. No free beer, no dinner. So we went to the bar upstairs and bought a couple of jugs of beer and grabbed a table on the deck and went to work on the jugs. When it was looking like the first jugs were near completion, Ben bought some reinforcements so we were force to consume those as well. Various people came by and joined us at the table including the boys from Warrington, Dragon Fly, and Starla from Alpha Omega. There was also a neat guy from Nationals named Ryan, a friend of Starla's who owned an R Boat. Dinner was finally served, awards were finally presented and Circe motored back to Queen City with our crew and Starla as a passenger as Alpha was staying over at ABYC. We ate the last of the custard tarts en route. We arrived back about 7:30, folded our jibs and called it a day.
Skipper Ron was pooped.