Ok, here comes the long version...
Saturday was a nice breeze, I would say about 10-12 knots. Tshan and I got a pretty good start; however, as soon as we started, we noticed everyone was trapeezing(mainly just crew) while we were not. As a matter of fact, I was on the leeward hull. We were in bad air, so we tacked over. We eventually got some clear air and I could trapeze, but we were still footing very low to keep up speed. After realizing that the rest of the spinnaker fleet was way ahead of us and we were behind the "fun" fleet(non-spinnaker boats), we decided to call it a day and head in. So, we took a DFL or a DSQ, I'm not really sure. Ater we got on the beach, we watched the first N20 come in, Andy Humphries and John Mcdonald. It was then Bob Curry, and then Chris Amador(CAB is his handle on the board I believe) with his wife. I do believe that was the order in the top three boat for boat. After the correction, it was Bob, Chris, and then Andy. I actually didn't look at the results, but that's what I remember hearing. So, please correct me if I'm wrong.
After we got to the beach, we discussed some things and realized that we just didn't have any power in the rig at all. We also bent the spreader bar extension while trying to shove the end cap back on. So we straightened that out and pushed it in the sleeve. We also made some changes on the boat. We raked the mast a little more forward and took some pre-bend out of the mast. Basically, we set our boat up closer to Chris's boat to hopefully power the boat up. We felt bound up and couldn't point at all the whole day. So, we had to try something different. I'm sure some of it was us, but it just didn't make sense that the boat just didn't "feel" right.
After working on the boat we went back to the pagoda and ate some BBQ and drank a couple of beers and called it a day. Tshan is an early night person, which I thought was funny, I don't know very many people like me that call it a late night at 9o'clock.
Sunday.....
We got started about 11:30 or so. There was a seabreez building, but a few minutes after the start it stopped. There was a thundershower that took it all away. At this point, we couldn't tell if our changes did anything, but it did seem better and we stayed up with Chris and his wife this time. Saturday, we never saw him after the start. I think we were last in this first race, but we felt better about ourselves because we were steady with Chris. The second race was better. The breeze built back up, but still light, ~7knots or less. We got a good start and we pretty much stayed with Chris and his wife on this race. It was pretty competitive. We were pointing right with Chris and keeping almost the same boat speed. He eventually eked out in front of us and beat us on this race too. Even though we came in last, we felt much better about the second day of racing. They of course were lighter than us, but we still kept up with them, a lot better than Saturday. Saturday, they and everyone else blew us out of the water.
I would say it was a success with us(Tom and I racing togeter) and me. I got to get a ride on an F16 and meet some of the F16 fleet. Tshan and Cab are great people along with the other people that I hung out with(Phillip Mumm, Ken(can't remember your last name), and Damon Linkous. I'm going to put this race on my calender for next year. I'm hoping to have my F16 by then. The venue is great too. The hosts are very accommodating and the races were ran very nicely. I do believe the same guy is going to run the NAF18 championship in October. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this one too. <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />
I have a feeling that the portsmouth ratings won't be turned in, just because of the nice laid back venue.