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Highlights:
Our start - right on the nail. Accelerating from there right around the course.
Downers:
None. Well, just a little bit of guilt about seeing the rappers, hull down over the horizon, far, far astern.
Result:
1st on CN and 1st on IRC.
Lessons Learnt:
Start aggressively. Gain a lead early and hang onto it. Ensure your boat has a smooth teflon bottom at all times. Buy new jibs regularly.
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Autumn Series Race 2. Friday 13 October
Wind 3-8 knots, North Easterly becoming 8 - 13 knots
This last week has been somewhat stressful. Jackal has just been lovingly pampered on the hard stand. We've scrubbed her bum to the bone; applied new epoxy primer and two coats of 'teflon' race antifoul at the very last minute. We've hired a massive self-drive cherry-picker and installed a new wind sensor at the mast head (we still can't get it to work, but it looks good). We've got the electronics working again, to read speed and depth. We've scrubbed and cleaned; new ropes; new fittings. Jackal has just had frenetic makeover.... in the face of shrinking tides. The last chance of relaunching her is on Thursday morning. Failure means a month on the hard, waiting for spring tides, but we make it, only just.
After this week of hardstand-hell, we're set to race on Friday 13th - an unlucky day for some - so it's with some trepidation that we rig and set sail for the race course, complete with Eric, our Navy Seal. Out there, it's a millpond. No wind. But after half an hour of 'drift practice' we find that the wind slowly fills from the North East. No cancellation then... All that work and all our high hopes won't be instantly dashed - at least not before the start.
We've been through a lot on land this past week, so it's a joy to feel Jackal come alive with the building breeze, slinking her teflon-coated nether regions through the water. We're running our new Quantum jib today and it sets beautifully - thanks Scott!
We start to play, sailing into the melee of boats all vying for starboard starting dominance. We cover Rapscallion, gybing and tacking to gain control pre-start - and this time actually manage it, hitting the line at good speed (after a couple of 360's to kill time) right on the nail, ahead of her and the upwind of the fleet. And then continue to accelerate right up to the top mark, East Bouy. Rounding this to port we set the bitch for a run to Pumphouse Port mark. We're several minutes up on the Rapper already which gives us confidence and, we hope, pressure for them.
Gybing around Pumphouse we continue on to Earth Station, drop the spinnaker and beat back to East Bouy, leaving west Pole to port. "wonder what the language is on the Rapper?" someone asks. A lively debate ensues as to Mike's various excuses later around the bar. "Ah, mate, we were chilling today". "Well it was a perfect course for Jackal". "I had a really bad morning, laying out the marks". "We had gear failure". "Of course, these are perfect conditions for Jackal"..... We check the time difference to the last mark rounded. 12 minutes. Plenty. Now we just have to maintain that difference.
Around East Bouy and we're back on a long downwind, right down to Earth Station mark again. And the course (despite our bets as to Mike's comments) is far from perfect - so we have to sail angles to try to maximise boat speed, worried that Rapscallion will gain. She doesn't seem to, and we turn to head back on our final beat to the finish transit. This time we head out to the reef to catch a little help from the tide, and tacking to port find ourselves right on the layline for the finish, close hauled with a steady breeze, finishing at what we reckon to be about 18 minutes ahead, with Rapscallion remaining hull-down over the horizon.
We are a little concerned about TNT, who seems well up on the fleet, but an unusually riotous de-brief and prize-giving sees our fears unfounded, this time at least.
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