I'm glad I didn't take the bowls
Many thanks for a great weekend Ross, the club put on an excellent event and I'll certainly be back.
my weekend:
Thursday night and the hole in the hull from the knee syndrome is repaired and the cruiser is loaded up and ready to roll
The missus is sick with the flu and several other people we know also have the virus, somehow I've managed to dodge that bullet for now
Friday- the bloody clock goes into slow-mo and the day drags, right up to 4:50 when the boss needs a hand to finish a job, the plan to escape early leaves well before I will
mutter mutter mutter
I finally get on the road just after 7:30pm
but only for ~40 odd minutes before Murphy's Law strikes, the cruiser suddenly shuts down and we roll ungracefully to the side of the road => your kidding me, old faithfull has let me down
Phonecall to the missus and she gets the kids out of bed and comes to get me, unfortunately in the car that DOESNT HAVE a towbar..... so back home we go and I grab the statesman and go and get the boat then another run to drag the cruiser back home..... transfer all the gear into the statesman and the clock says 1:00am, I'm beat so bed and an early start is the call
Finally arrive and I'm the 2nd last boat to turn up, setup is a little rushed along with the entry and I'm into the briefing, finish off putting the boat together and I'm last on the water for the first race.....
Race 1, I made a mistake, I rushed the setup and got it all wrong and the result was a really badly handling boat with massive helm and constantly locking in irons, at the end of the race I was so exhausted from fighting with it I didn't want to race in the next race..... I needed a spell to get my strength back, I even did the toss the coin thing, heads and we race tails and we have a spell, it came up heads, ok so lets make it the best of 3..... & 3 heads later it was racing and no spell for me !!
Lunch time and after a chat to Ross and others I went and re-set my rig and found the main cause of my badly misbehaving boat which turned out to be loose rudders that had allowed the rudders to slip backwards nearly and inch, combined with WAY TO MUCH downhaul its any wonder I had a boat that was up for a boxing match and a half..... battered and bruised race 2 here we come,
race 2 and we were going much better but still not as well as she should have been going, the helm was still ever so slight but atleast I wasn't constantly dragging on the tiller, the handbrake effect was mostly gone. An over full sail in the windy conditions was my next mistake, this was how I'd thrown it together from the beginning and I hadn't changed it during lunch, what I had was going to have to do for race 3 that was back-to-back too....
Race 1... 3rd mozzie to cross the line, which is really the last mozzie because one was being towed back after the mast came down just after the start.
race 2... 3rd mozzie to cross the line again, but I'm getting better
race 3.... and I'm up where I should be competing in a tight race for 2nd right up until a bad tactial decision is made and I find myself with no wind and going backwards inbetween being stuck in irons yet again....
I cross the line as the 3rd mozzie to finish yet again, consistant atleast !!
Sunday
Mast rake changed, batterns reset, downhaul goes back to a starting point and various other things are re-done, something I really should have done during Saturday Lunch time.....
bloody hindsight
race 4 and its a nail biter between the 3 +65 boats we really raced well and it was close racing with one getting the advantage and the others catching it back before you knew it
again a 3rd mozzie was my finishing place.....
Race 5 and the wind had dropped off slightly, it was just enough to give the old girl an advantage, her old rag sail works well in the lighter stuff and it showed.
Saturday night had also been very informative as I listened to several discussion on race tacticts and boat tune, one conversation in particular gave me a fantastic start for race 5, I even beat Ross across the line before he sailed away... During the race we slowly clawed a lead out and maintained it more buy good luck than good sailing, the 2nd last leg saw me with a great lead, that lead was almost taken back on the last leg with a wind change and some great sailing, again it came down to seconds for the finish and I managed to hold onto 2nd mozzie to finish... just !!!
The last race also had one other thing bite me..... remember the missus and her flu, well it caught up with me about mid race, I was getting colder by the minute and the strength was draining fast, I was glad to cross the finish line and beach the boat asap, unusual for me as I usually head back out for a bit more sailing.
Boat on beach and I headed for the showers, shivering all the way, with a great hot shower done I had enough strength to pack up and load everything into the car and trailer, off to presentations, and a final thanks to those that had helped me over the w/end..
special thanks to Johnno too
We leave and head for home, the flu has now got a firm grip and the heater is cranked up, a caravan in the front of our little convoy means the statey isn't happy, she doesn't do 90kph, too slow for overdrive and too fast to have reasonable rpm in the lower gear, we're chewing fuel like mad and a 1/4 of a tank has gone as we roll into Arrart, the others all stop for human fuel and I head on for car fuel, the art of being struck by the flu and getting out of a nice warm car to refuel wasn't a good one, so I decided to make the run for home and let hunger take its place at home along with a nice warm bed...
At home, ring the boss and do the I'm dying here call, RDO tomorrow check !
toast for a snack followed by a nice roast meal check !
sleeeeeeeeep ...... check !
Looking forward to the pics when they are uploaded
(Ross can you let me know when and where the lovely lady who did the entries and ran around with the Nikon camera posts the pics please ?)
Kingy
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