Day 1

We awoke this morning to the trailing edge of Danny, and by the time I was driving to the club, there were breaks of blue sky, it looked good to get some racing in hopefully. When I got to the club, it was blowing about 10 from the west, and I got my fleet color and rigged the boat. Our race circle was 5.4 miles from the club, and naturally straight upwind. Had a beautiful sail out on St. Margaret's Bay, and then the wind shut off, and we had to get towed to the race course, not usually a good sign. Andy Roy assured me that the sea breeze would fill in, and sure enough 3 p.m. it come in, and in no time we had 15 knots steady. We did have some gusts higher, but we mostly saw 15 knots out there today.

First race started at 3:30 p.m. and believe it or not, all fleets got off without a single recall. I got a good start at the pin end, Tracy Usher won the pin, and I was next, with an Australian on my hip. Started off the the left side and sure enough along came the right shift, and we were hung out to dry. My upwind speed was rather poor, but I made up for it with some blazing downwind speed, but not enough to make a dent in this really solid fleet. I ended 37 in the first race.

We finished the first race around 4:45 p.m. and as we were finishing, they already had the Apprentice Masters fleet going for the second race. No time for even a protein bar, right up to the line, set the stopwatch and go. I decided to try the boat end, and got a decent start, working out to the right side of the course, only to once again get hung out to dry, this time by a left shift. Just not my day I suppose as I finished with another 37.

Oh well not the end of the world, had a lot of fun sailing, and then had a great planing reach all the way to the cove at which point the sea breeze shut off as fast as it had started, and it shut off dead, leaving a couple of hundred Lasers drifting. We had to get towed into the ramps, and hauled out boats up the big hill to the parking area (luckily they had tractors to help us out). Wow, what a long day, we didn't get in until 7:30 p.m. Having left the dock at 11:30 a.m. that was a long day on the water, but I am glad we got our two races in.

Tomorrow I am assigned to the yellow fleet, which means I start third and sail the outside loop of the trapezoid, different to today. So let's hope the results are different as well. Sea Breeze is supposed to fill tomorrow at around 1 p.m. but then it looks like it will go to the west and shut down in the mid afternoon. I hope the sea breeze holds.

I was surprised that there were no boats with water available for the competitors out there. I will have to bring my own water tomorrow.