Thank you for your patience!
Wednesday, September 18, 2013
Yes I still blog at times...
Getting married this year meant priorities shifted from crafting semi-coherent ramblings about yachting and generally messing about on boats... Alas, we did it, Nicole and I are hitched, and the schedule is clearing to find more free time to hoist the laundry, haul the mail, and write potentially confused retrospectives on all the action.
2013 AYC Eliza Island Race Recap
A fleet of 11 AYC race teams set into Fidalgo Bay and received the first signs to the end of summer descending upon us with grey skies chilling the bay and faint misty breezes dampening gel coat. AYC resurrected the Eliza Island race for 2013, a course that sends boats from the refinery pier northbound to the “RG” buoy north of Eliza Island and back.
Reaching the first re-start clustered Siren, Cat Sass, and Emoyeni together while Boomer, a yacht clearly never punished by Long Bay, worked their business between Guemes and Huckleberry islands. A new northwesterly filled from the right first and Emoyeni seemed to be the first boat to take advantage as she wound up and greased a wake toward William Point (Or Point Wilson if you’re navigating by movies starring Tom Hanks…)
Soon Emoyeni would be rolled by Siren and Cat Sass while Boomer magically worked through the huckleberry gap the furthest west and seemingly in the better pressure. Eventually the pea soup fog rolled in, along with a rumbling freighter, and boats had to divert their attention from schooling on competitors to simply keeping their boat on course while avoiding tonnage. Eliza Island began to define herself as the fog lifted and revealed Cat Sass and Lucky Duck making way up the west side of Eliza while Boomer, Solitaire, Siren, Corvus, and Spice were split out east. Slightly behind, Little Annie, and Myrica were in tow following the stern of Emoyeni. Meanwhile, somewhere in Catalina, Walt n’ Jerry were landing a 17lb King salmon off peapod rocks.
First around the mark was the only multi hull this side of the 38th parallel without a single kiwi on board, followed by Boomer, Siren, and in a came-outta-nowhere move Lucky Duck. Solitaire would follow Siren down the west side of Eliza while Cat Sass, Boomer, and Lucky Duck opted for a more gentlemanly east side transit. Corvus and Emoyeni crossed tacks and diced it up wondering who would lay first and by barely a boat length Emoyeni rounded as Corvus escaped laying a new red racing stripe down her port side.
At 14:32:46 the Islander Bahama 30 crossed the line which, for those scoring atop cap santé, was the first boat of the day to kiss the finish and reap the bragging rights of what’s been known over the past few years as a damn tough race to finish. Behind Emoyeni by a freshly calculated 5 min 34 sec were the time-out/re-start victims aboard the Viva27 Cat Sass, followed by the little Martin 242, Boomer, which was 3rd over the line. As handicap correction was applied Emoyeni enjoyed an inflated delta of nearly 18 minutes ahead of Boomer who secured a hard fought 2nd place for the day. Lucking out into 3rd was Lucky duck, followed by the woodiest boat in the fleet, the Buchanan sloop Myrica in 4th. 5th place was earned by the relatively quite sailors aboard Siren, 6th place awarded to Little Annie with guest scorer, and hanging around in 7th place the Islander 36, Spice. 8th place goes to the boat caught playing card games near Eliza rock, the SC27 Solitaire. Singlehanding his way into 9th place, Scott Peterson in the CS30 Corvus while 10th place was awarded to the boat seemingly oblivious to the fact there was a real race happening yet somehow managed to put the hull around the course, Walt n’ Jerry on the mighty Catalina 27 Syn-di-Cat. And although they were only 6 minutes behind Emoyeni at the finish somewhere between the negative PHRF rating and a downwind tack gone awry sent the AC27 Cat Sass tumbling down the standings into 11th place…
Just enough nor’ westerly developed ahead of the start to get competitors off and reaching on port tack to the gap between saddlebag and huckleberry island. Emoyeni nailed a mid-line start in clear air while watching Boomer, Solitaire, and Little Annie fight for position on the favored pin end. To leeward were the parallel hulls and manual tacking jib of the mighty Cat Sass went roaring by, seemingly a few minutes late to the start. Cat Sass would eventually park up between the gap of conventional wisdom where the first race re-start would take place. Meanwhile, somewhere in Catalina, Walt n’ Jerry were taking down their kite and pulling crab pots from the bay.
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| The AC27 Cat Sass blows to leeward of the SC27 Solitaire |
Reaching the first re-start clustered Siren, Cat Sass, and Emoyeni together while Boomer, a yacht clearly never punished by Long Bay, worked their business between Guemes and Huckleberry islands. A new northwesterly filled from the right first and Emoyeni seemed to be the first boat to take advantage as she wound up and greased a wake toward William Point (Or Point Wilson if you’re navigating by movies starring Tom Hanks…)
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| Boomer spend most of the day ahead of everybody. Most of the day. |
Soon Emoyeni would be rolled by Siren and Cat Sass while Boomer magically worked through the huckleberry gap the furthest west and seemingly in the better pressure. Eventually the pea soup fog rolled in, along with a rumbling freighter, and boats had to divert their attention from schooling on competitors to simply keeping their boat on course while avoiding tonnage. Eliza Island began to define herself as the fog lifted and revealed Cat Sass and Lucky Duck making way up the west side of Eliza while Boomer, Solitaire, Siren, Corvus, and Spice were split out east. Slightly behind, Little Annie, and Myrica were in tow following the stern of Emoyeni. Meanwhile, somewhere in Catalina, Walt n’ Jerry were landing a 17lb King salmon off peapod rocks.
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| Rick and Deano attempt to lead the fleet nowhere at the first restart |
First around the mark was the only multi hull this side of the 38th parallel without a single kiwi on board, followed by Boomer, Siren, and in a came-outta-nowhere move Lucky Duck. Solitaire would follow Siren down the west side of Eliza while Cat Sass, Boomer, and Lucky Duck opted for a more gentlemanly east side transit. Corvus and Emoyeni crossed tacks and diced it up wondering who would lay first and by barely a boat length Emoyeni rounded as Corvus escaped laying a new red racing stripe down her port side.
As Kites popped and courses were chosen it became obvious those who held west were advantaged with better breeze and a shorter distance back to the gap of conventional wisdom, not to mention the ability to hold a kite the whole way. East hanging boats couldn’t lay William point without going back to whites. Siren managed to park themselves up near Carter Point where Emoyeni and Solitaire gybed away. The breeze held a quick time-out while the three west most boats attempted to negotiate the eddy currents. Emoyeni being most heads-up gybed back at the first sign of the filling northwest pressure and rocketed away with the kite pulling hard on a beam reach.
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| Emoyeni sails out of a Tom Hanks movie and into a John Carpenter movie |
Ahead in the distance Cat Sass had put a good 40 minutes on the fleet but began mowing the lawn between saddlebag and huckleberry islands waiting for the door to open up. Boomer had doused and was working hard to escape Samish Bay, giving up all their lead over Emoyeni. As the leading monohulls compressed on Cat Sass’ position, still playing Sisyphus, long eyes spied the gap of unconceivable wisdom appeared to look, gasp, favorable. Refinery stacks showed a decent westerly flowing through the Guemes Channel and if the momentum and current hold okay, the first boat to Southeast Point could get the new breeze first.
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| Nate still can't believe we made it through there |
Boomer, Solitare, and Siren followed lead boat Emoyeni into the gap of unconceivable wisdom as the wind softened. Drawing kites turned to drooping bags of nylon but the west side of huckleberry was a running river of positive flood current. Those who kept their heads out of their boats and played their cards right kept inching forward. It was ultimately the turning point for teams Cat Sass as their boat for boat lead relinquished to Emoyeni. With all boats firmly behind the team nosed into the new Guemes breeze first with victory assured barring the front of the boat falling off suddenly.
At 14:32:46 the Islander Bahama 30 crossed the line which, for those scoring atop cap santé, was the first boat of the day to kiss the finish and reap the bragging rights of what’s been known over the past few years as a damn tough race to finish. Behind Emoyeni by a freshly calculated 5 min 34 sec were the time-out/re-start victims aboard the Viva27 Cat Sass, followed by the little Martin 242, Boomer, which was 3rd over the line. As handicap correction was applied Emoyeni enjoyed an inflated delta of nearly 18 minutes ahead of Boomer who secured a hard fought 2nd place for the day. Lucking out into 3rd was Lucky duck, followed by the woodiest boat in the fleet, the Buchanan sloop Myrica in 4th. 5th place was earned by the relatively quite sailors aboard Siren, 6th place awarded to Little Annie with guest scorer, and hanging around in 7th place the Islander 36, Spice. 8th place goes to the boat caught playing card games near Eliza rock, the SC27 Solitaire. Singlehanding his way into 9th place, Scott Peterson in the CS30 Corvus while 10th place was awarded to the boat seemingly oblivious to the fact there was a real race happening yet somehow managed to put the hull around the course, Walt n’ Jerry on the mighty Catalina 27 Syn-di-Cat. And although they were only 6 minutes behind Emoyeni at the finish somewhere between the negative PHRF rating and a downwind tack gone awry sent the AC27 Cat Sass tumbling down the standings into 11th place…
Thursday, April 11, 2013
2013 Anacortes Yacht Club Tulip Regatta Recap
If it’s April and your hobbies have nothing to do with botany, Atown has a regatta for you. The annual Tulip Regatta features boats, canvas, a salmon dinner, and world renowned drinking games. This year’s rendition featured guest PRO Dr. Chris “Still Crazy” White and an army of volunteers who worked race committee like their paychecks depended on it. Over 2 days of varying conditions from every cardinal direction 6 races were run and no hurt feelings reports were filed.
PHRF Fleet 1 featured the new kid on the block, Illusionist, disappearing and reappearing on the podium in first place. Slithering into 2nd place was the smallest boat in the fastest fleet, the viper 640 KAA, and coming out of hibernation the mighty Teddy Bear took 3rd.
In the F18 Fleet where two hulls are better than one the podium found the Rum Line accelerating into 1st place. In 2nd place, driving it like they stole it were Joy and Ian on the Joyride, followed by the super fancy looking Team Storm in 3rd.
In the Holy Cross 27 Fleet, 1st place was awarded to the boat with the least amount of hull paint, Little Blue Dune Buggy. In 2nd place was the boat with an unusually large amount of y chromosomes, Wild Rumpus, and battling to the podium in 3rd was the little man on Giant Slayer.
In PHRF Fleet 4, a dominating 6 point performance was pulled off by the most delicious transom in the fleet, the Moore Uff Da. 2nd place was taken by the boat I’ve affectionately named the burpin turd, Eric Beemer’s Surfin Bird. And in third place, putting their best foot forward and keeping their keel off cap santé rock was the mighty Blackfoot.
Puerto Rican 24’s were hotly contested by a load of boats that begin with the letter M. Supreme dominance was awarded via 1st place to Magic Juan with her magic main by 2 points ahead of the other (not Bill Lee’s wizardry) Merlin. Rounding out the podium like rounding leeward marks was Mayhem! with a guest or two from those all-state insurance commercials.
Lastly in PHRF Fleet 6, nobody can stop em’ with mustaches like those, the Walt n’ Jerry show sailing “more quicklier” on the Syn-di-Cat in 1st place. 2nd place went to the none-design turbo tricked SJ24, The Orange Blob, and in 3rd place with more Larry’s than any other boat on the bay was Kyle Saum’s Kymodoce.
Observations and musings in no particular order:
- Can we all agree that leeward marks in
- I’d like to speak for PHRF Fleet 4 and announce that after careful consideration it can be determined that the open transom on a
- Fantastic work by PRO Dr. Chris White & the race committee crew. Races were run very smoothly and we appreciated the fine work over the VHF airwaves. The pep talking/cheerleading was also a nice touch.
- If you’re in Bill Bowman’s way while he’s starting (as much as it might not look like it), Bill Bowman will let you, and everyone else within a ¼ mile earshot, know you’re in his way.
- It’s not an original thought but how did the SC27 fleet, known to be a bit more loud n’ colorful, show up with 5 rigs flying 5 white kites?
- In PHRF Fleet 4 Emoyeni and Lucky Duck developed a notoriety each race for showing up at the startline and promptly never being seen or heard from again. Fear not, they didn’t sink.
- If SC27 hulls aren’t attractively busy enough for you, you should check out the F18 canvas!
- Somebody told me Tom Stockton broke his
- Somebody else told me Dean Vandament is the Stig. I know Dean and I’m buying it.
- Now that Jason Joiner has announced his presence to the SJ24 Fleet I fear for any fellow competitors sailing with cut-rate insurance plans.
Monday, February 11, 2013
NW Riggers Goosebumps 2013, Race 5 Re-Cap
Missing on the water was the Tuna 525 Full Moon, reportedly due to illness which has sidelined pretty much everybody in the greater Seattle
Race 5 in the 2013 Goosebumps gets a course creativity award for setting a north-south start/finish line off Westlake Ave with good n’ steady 5-8kn blowing from the NW. The RC set a two lap course around cove and freeway marks. You could say the boat end of the line was HEAVILY favored.
Race 5 in the 2013 Goosebumps gets a course creativity award for setting a north-south start/finish line off Westlake Ave with good n’ steady 5-8kn blowing from the NW. The RC set a two lap course around cove and freeway marks. You could say the boat end of the line was HEAVILY favored.
In the 2nd start fleet we got trapped at 1:30 being taken away from the line by a Tbird below us and blocked out of a tack to port away by a black dinghy above us, stalling our planned gybe to the line by a good 20 seconds. By the time the Tbird hitched for the line we were both a good 20-30 seconds late, however we missed the midline pile-up and found a clear lane at the committee boat with the kite up and drawing good. If you didn’t absolutely nail the start like Zephyr did, being late actually gave the open space to sail out to the front of the fleet.
Reaching the cove mark proved a very tricky rounding necessitating a gybe to port with 1st start leaders (finishing their first lap) reaching the mark hot on startboard at the same time. Like the traffic at the start, the cove turned into an SR520 stop-n’-go without the luxury of ABS. Fending off Ignitor, Friday, and the Newport 33 Free spirit who had us completely boxed in, we watched ourselves get spat out the back while many of the 2nd start participants found their way up and over the top of us.
Much of the fleet remained on port tack looking for the lift off the shoreline of floating homes while we hitched out to starboard for what looked like better breeze and certainly cleaner air in the middle of the lake. The tactic paid off pretty well and we clawed back a number of positions. We rounded freeway on the heels of Free Spirit and immediately put the kite up.
By the cove mark we had worked over Free Spirit and were closing in on the Columbia 26, The Lab (who was having a tremendous race too…) – The Lab took the rounding a bit wide and without the nightmare traffic previously encountered we snuck in and over to weather and began the beat to freeway. Winds started going light and Free Spirit began water-lining us to death…
The tight reach to the finish was rather uneventful, save for the kayaker paddling directly in the pathway of many finishing boats. We held off True Blue and Friday, but couldn’t reel Free Spirit back in with her waterline proving a bit too much for us off the wind. Based on the preliminary results I’m guessing we placed somewhere between 11th and 13th place, despite the results having us in 15th. There are some strange results entries that have The Lab sitting in 7th place despite the fact they finished a few boats behind us, and 3 boats engaged in some form of camoflauge magically got between us and Free Spirit… I don’t think that happened, my crew and I were there…
Cake or Death’s crew on the fine sunny Sunday was Nicole on the pointy end, Fisch and BK pulling strings, Caleb in doubt and easin her out, and Kyle yelling starboard more times than reasonably necessary.
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