Top Three Postions are Getting Very Close.
It was light air, but some pretty exciting racing for the 5th race of the
2007 A-Cat World Championships.
The seas were lightly choppy, the wind light, but quite steady, and
best of all, the kelp had disappeared. We pondered where it could have
gone overnight – but it was gone. Kelp is normally a problem
while sailing in Hawks Channel on the Ocean Side of the Florida Keys.
Thanks to the powers to be that today it was not the usual problem.
The Races! Getting started was a problem, however.
Something went wrong on the first start and the RC sent boats out to
round up the fleet and send them back for another start. Hmmm! Could
it be they might have been a millimeter slow in some sort of flag and
were in fear of another stupid determination by the International Judges.
We just don’t
know at this time. But, will report on this when we find out the problem
with that first start.
The next start had a nice looking line, but the aggressive fleet caused
a General Recall.
The line was again reset and this time a Black Flag Start was called for.
In the case of the Black Flag any boat over the line early after the one-minute
signal when the Preparatory Flag is dropped will be disqualified for that
race. Pretty stiff penalty.
The fleet all behaved themselves quite nicely and there was finally a clean
start about a half hour later than the scheduled start should have been.
The Class Flag came down and there was finally a clean start
Glenn Ashby of Australia did his usual thing and made the first weather
mark round in the lead. Mitch Booth of the Netherlands was second just
ahead of Lars Guck of the USA. Pease Glaser of the USA and first female
sailor overall was also close at hand. Olympic Tornado sailor, Robbie
Daniel found himself just ahead of Pete Melvin of the USA.
Lars Guck (42) rounded the first weather mark just ahead of Pease
Glaser (37). Glaser went on to win the race.
Things started getting shook up on the next time around the weather
mark. Pete Melvin had moved up close to Glenn Ashby, Booth had slipped
to 3rd, Pease Glaser stayed in 4th place, but Lars Guck slipped to
5th.
The wind was slowly dying and took a slight shift to the west, or the
left side of the course looking upwind. Pease Glaser took advantage
of the left shift by going left and moved into the lead around the
last windward mark. Mitch Booth was close behind her, with Melvin slipping
to 3rd spot.
Going into this race, Glenn Ashby and Lars Guch were tied. At this
last windward mark, Ashby was about two boat lengths ahead of Guck
as they both headed for the downwind finish.
At this finish and moving out was Glaser. Surprisingly, Guck had tacked
short of the finish layline, then got a header to take him down to
the finish line faster, finishing in 2nd place. Melvin setttled for
3rd place, Ashby took a 4th and Booth slipped to 5th place
Roughly speaking, this seems to be following top positions using a
throwout of their worst races:
Position, Sailor, Points w/TO
1. Lars Guck 6
2. Glenn Ashby 7
3. Pete Melvine 10
4. Mitch Booth 25
5. Charlie Ogletree 27
6. Phil Kinder 46
7. Robbie Daniel 56
8. Pease Glaser 65
9. Chad Atkins 65
10. Woody Cope 71
Only one race was completed. Two races are again planned for Thursday
starting at 11AM
At this point CLICK HERE for the standings: