Very pleasant conditions for 2018-2019 season kick-off. Many thanks to PRO Todd Blekicki and Helper Tyler Phillips for setting a well-positioned course and efficiently rolling through 5 races.
As more-or-less promised in the forecast, winds were steady 5-9 knots velocity with direction oscillating tightly around due south. Tide was incoming, but I didn’t see much current effect during racing – maybe post-rain/snow flow of the river cancelled that out? Also, the course was generally between the two channels so that helped.
With a square well-sized line, steady breeze and no big current effect, neither side seemed especially favored on the upwind leg. The slight oscillations in direction and pressure cycled fast enough to cancel out. All of which led to close bunching at the first upwind mark and a lot of, ah, ‘intricate’ boat maneuvering. Good way to knock off some rules and boat handling rust, no?
In these conditions for upwind, a mid-line start is ideal but clear air is absolutely critical. If you’re not a great starter (e.g. me), the pin seemed to work out as a way to stay clear and focus on boat speed. But the risk there is coming back in and having to face an ugly wall of starboard tackers. So I decided in the last race to ‘practice’ a mid-line start and – predictably – it was less than ideal. Useful lesson for this frequent occurrence is to bite the bullet and get to clear air as quickly as possible.
Downwind for all the races seemed to offer some subtle tactical gains. You could play the slight oscillations and stay out of the wind shadows by alternating between by-the-lee on the VA side and a little hotter to the MD side depending on the puff-of-the-moment. That worked out well for me in the first four races but in the last I took it too far to the MD side when I saw the VA side looked crushed (momentarily as it turned out) and lost several spots. Know when to fold em’, eh?
Thanks to Tom Hutton who gave up a day of sailing on a sunny day to give us the opportunity to race on the last day the frostbite season. The NNW to NNE light to nearly non-existent breeze and a strong ebb tide made for challenging starts and windward legs on the four one lap and one two lap races.
Today we had light turnout and light shifty wind. For those that chose not to come, I think it was the wrong decision. It was a super nice day with temps around 50 and abundent sunshine. The wind ended up coming from every direction and was mostly between 1 and 5. Jim and Melissa did an excellent job running the races and changed the course 3 times to try and account for the shifts. It ended up playing out that 3 of the 5 races were reaching races. The other two started of with the wind coming from the windward mark but shifting during the race. I found with the light air, it was helpful to sit on top of the dagger board most of the day. Also starting well was helpful. While my position was fine for the starts, the people that came to the line with speed tended to be the ones in front. Something that is important to remember the when the start line is parallel to the wind with the pin to windward is that starting at the pin can get you pinched out by the leeward boats that can head you up.
One more week left so I hope to see everyone out next weekend!
The race committee (thanks Nabeel and Francisco) smartly kept the marks in place for the second race but renamed the marks from leeward to windward, and windward to leeward, so you might call that a shifty day. In the second race i started on port on the right end of the line while the fleet sailed on starboard on the left end of the line, and in a very light wind once around the course, maintained a lead and won. On such a light shifty day the key for me to keeping the boat moving was watching the windward boats for indications of possible shifts, and sometimes powering up by bearing off on short term headers instead of tacking.
