It's always interesting when the spinnaker goes up

Not certain how to describe yesterday’s race – but one of the crew said at the end “its always interesting when the spinnaker goes up”

Winds were moving all over the place and varying from 4-20kts which made for difficult up wind sailing. The course was once around N2 (see beneath) with us starting in a windward direction. The best course was for a port tack start. We lined up ready to sweep round for a quick port start only to be blocked by a combination of Codzilla and one of the sailboats due to start later (they are supposed to stay away form the start line until their time is ready).  It was a minor inconvenience, but we headed to the port side of the start line and could see four or five boats coming towards us on a starboard tack. We had to give way, but we started well, and they then had to immediately tack on to port to head towards the windward mark. We could keep our momentum since we didn’t need to tack and were then able to catch the fleet.

The higher winds are better for us and we were even able to briefly overtake Charisma2,  Beneteau 36.7 with a PHRF rating of 84 compared to our 171. Of course they then put their foot down and screeched past us. We deployed the spinnaker sailed downwind with winds shifting in direction and speed – a lot. Eagle and Uncle Joe were following us (but they did start 6 minutes after us) and then at the leeward mark we managed to take down the spinnaker nicely and head back up wind. Chuck was having a workout on the mainsail responding to wind gusts to allow me to keep control at the helm. One of the boats had a serious spinnaker takedown problem (we think it was Uncle Joe) and dropped out of the race.

When we rounded the windward mark the crew on deck were raising the spinnaker as we were furling the genoa. We went too fast and should have left the genoa out a little longer because the wind gusted inflated the spinnaker and pulled Joe two feet off the deck while he was holding the halyard. The other crew member, Morgan, helped out and got a line caught around his finger. We are playing an interesting game of learning the limits. We found another one and will correct it next time we race. Good news – both Morgan and Joe reported that a drink or two fixed their injuries.

We headed off to the finish line without incident. We were last to cross the line, but one boat dropped out of the race so we didn’t come last. That’s four races in a row. Now awaiting the handicap corrected times.

Beer on dock was a good solution to the aches and pains of the race.  When we were sitting at the dock, Sean and Sandy, live aboards adjacent to us walked by and said they saw us out at the races as they were motoring by.  “We have some great pictures of you dropping the spinnaker in the water”.