Summer Race #2

Wind was from the NNW at 4-8 knots, veering to the WSW by the end of the night.  The ebb started around 18:30 and was not much of a factor during the race.  The course for all divisions was from H to B and back.

Tonight started a little different for us as I brought two people from work to go sailing.  They had never sailed before and I looked forward to introducing them to the sport.

We left the slip and hoisted the main in the harbor before heading out into a decent northerly.  The Venturi effect seemed to be helping the breeze in the middle of the river.  We sailed down to H and then headed upwind for a bit.  We noticed that the east side of the river had significantly less wind and decided to avoid that area.  This meant going left after the start.

We then judged the line to be mostly square and decided we would run the line in the dying breeze in order to get to the west side of the river as fast as possible.  Our start went as planned and we worked our way west into the channel.  There we found some good breeze and passed a few boats from the earlier start that had gone to the east.

Behind us and in our bad air was Merlin.  They proceeded to sail above our bad air and pass us to windward.  It was quite a demonstration of superior boat speed.  I thought we were sailing well in our own right, so the speed from Merlin can only be attributed to their great work in passing us.  I did almost everything I could to prevent that from happening.

Unfortunately, by passing us to windward on port tack, we were prevented from working further west.  We wanted to tuck into the left side of the course and take advantage of the veering wind, but the close proximity of the boats prevented us from tacking.  Eventually, we tacked a few times, but Merlin covered us each time. 

Finally I went for a close tack to get to their left.  This required a massive duck to get around their stern.  I neglected to mention my plans to the crew, so we did not back the jib as much as desired, so I had to over steer to avoid any contact and that slowed us down.  Fortunately, we were finally able to get some left side leverage on Merlin and the wind helped us get to the mark just ahead of them. 

The downwind leg turned out to be a tight reach in the veering breeze.  That is a perfect angle for our boat and with good work on trimming, we were able to stretch out from the other boats.  One spinnaker boat looked to roll us to windward, but I headed up to prevent that.  I certainly was not going to allow our speed to get hurt in a tight race by being rolled.  They eventually got stuck below us and I regretted that they were unable to pass us.  They would have needed more separation to pass us.

We finished the race and sailed on for a while.  The breeze was nice from the WSW and allowed some long reaching up and down the river.  The work friends got a chance to steer after the race and seemed to enjoy it.  Hopefully this experience will result in them trying to sail some more.