Perfect late summer evening. Wind was from the south between 6 and 14 knots. Current was flooding. C course was from H to K and back. A&B sailed H to K to G to H.
We arrived at the usual time for the race. The boat had some water in the bilge, so we spent some time on boat maintenance before heading out to the course around 17:30. As soon as we cleared the breakwater, we turned into the southerly and hoisted the sails. We were a little tight on time, but the Half Moon was in the area, so we cracked off and went to take a look.
Seems like the boat still had its original crew of surly prisoners because we did not even get a wave from the people on deck. It was about 400 years ago when the crew told Henry Hudson that the river ended shortly and he never did go much further. Maybe they are channeling that energy.
After seeing the floating replica (complete with radar and generator running), we turned upwind to get to the start. It took a while against the current and I fired up the iron sail to get a reading on the start line. The starboard end was favored. Since the line was backwards, the starboard end was the pin.
We decided early to start at the pin in a barging position. We assumed like last week that boats would get pulled back from the favored end and give us enough room to hit it at the start with good speed. We also decided to make sure we covered the Bugaboo maneuver. As I have written many times, the Bugaboo maneuver is going left towards Croton in a southerly. Having the current flooding made this an iron clad requirement for us and we would do everything we could to protect the left.
The start went as planned and we had the main competitor on our heels. I stuck the boat up for about 2 minutes in an effort to get the competitor to tack away to the right. When they finally tacked, we started sailing properly and our speed went from 3 knots to about 5. The left side paid off early and we only had to deal with the boats that went left with us.
About half way up the leg, we were straddling a 40 degree wind shift. We got knocked 40 degrees, dug in a little, tacked and then got knocked again on the new tack. We decided to head back to the left as the Bugaboo effect works pretty much up the entire leg. This second tack put us way to the left of the competitors and that allowed us to get a decent lead by the first mark.
The ride downhill was great. We had the current at our back and cruised across the line. The wind built up a little and we sailed around for a while. As it got darker, it felt like 21:00 when it was really 19:30. Shortly after 20:00, the wind completely stopped. This was odd as it went from a 12-14 from the south to 4 from the west. At this point, the sign was clear and we headed in.
It was a pleasant night on the river and all boats finished the race. After the race, I counted at least 4 other boats sailing around in the waning light. The conditions were ideal and it was nice to see some boats take advantage of the second to last Wednesday night. Having the darkness creep in sooner was a stark reminder that the season ends next week.
No comments:
Post a Comment