Race Notes 6/18/2009

Race notes: 6/18/2009

Conditions: I would call it medium. 10 – 15 knots. Dark water in the puffs. Current is less than last week, the river height has come down. Probably a little more than 1.5 knots. Overcast skys, totally flat river until half hour before the start so there was no chop or rollers to speak of.

Crew aboard: Libby, Toni, Tami, Rich, Rebecca and myself

My bad on the start, I had a good bead on it, but lost concentration in the traffic. I wound up underneath Enchantress moving slow at the start. It took a bit to get sheeted in and by then SP&M was underneath us and out front. We had to gas Enchantress a bit to get out in front, and then tack as soon as SP&M ran out of river. Which put Nanuk on crossing ahead of us on starboard just like last week. We ducked behind Nanuk and put the hammer down and made it to the first mark well ahead of the fleet. A quick tack around the weather mark and spinnaker set fire drill commenced. We got it up OK, but still need practice accomplishing a “Cidgem” fast set.

The fleet was having a difference of opinion about where to sail going back up the river. I chose the Washington shore yet again. Nanuk chose the Sand Island track yet again, and since the downwind mark was on the Oregon side, I think he convinced several of the others to follow him that direction. But I happen to have been passed a couple times sailing that course and know that the fasted way to mark #4 is right past mark #3. You wind up fast reaching to #4 instead of sailing slowly dead down wind to get there.

We did a VERY conservative spinnaker take down, probably lost a minute there, but it really did not matter. We tacked around the mark and with the ripping current behind us the difference between us and the next boat to round was magnified by every second that we spent sailing with the current behind us, while they were still heading into it to last mark.

A tug and barges made life difficult. It went right through the fleet as they were rounding the mark. Ugly.

We sailed past the concert on the way back, short tacking up the St Helens channel, Good job on the winches crew! Good race!