Spring Series: Race 6 [Posted by Steve on Mon 18th Apr 05]

Drag race, dolphins and damage

We had a good start, squeezing Tigerlilly out at the committee boat end to take pole position. It was a drag race up the first 'beat', as we matched Celerity for speed with full main and No2 through the rather lumpy waves. We both rounded the first mark having made it on the same tack off the start line, and popped our kites to enjoy 7.5kts along the top reach. We managed to get inside Celerity at the gybe mark, though as we went into the gybe there was a big splash behind us... I looked around to see a pod of dolphins, very nice though not quite what you need when you about to gybe! We did the gybe well and sailed down the next tight reach, though Celerity managed to get over the top of us into the bottom mark and rounded ahead.

The next leg was more of a beat and after a few crossings with Celerity we got to the top mark again, coming in on the starboard lay-line. Chris was down to leeward trimming the genoa, and shouted starboard 2 or 3 times. As I lent in to see what was happening there was Celerity on port bearing down straight at us. There was nothing we could do, and she hit us on our port quarter (see photos of the damage in the gallery). With this there was some shouting! After rounding the windward mark we did not pop the kite as we had lost the push pit and guard rail, and were more worried about sorting out the hole in the side of the boat!


Sam, our guest crew member for the weekend (who has never sailed before and had just come along for the ride!) got rather more action than he'd bargained for, as he was set to work with a handy H2O Sports sticker and lots of duck tape. Meanwhile we dropped the No2 genoa and put up the No3, as we wanted to sail the boat as upright as possible to keep the damaged area dry.

However, we made it down the short run to the finish, taking line honours and 1st on corrected time. When we got in Celerity did the honourable thing are retired from the race, and kindly bought the crew a round of beer

Because of the damage we will not be able to sail tomorrow evening, and it is unlikely that we will be able to compete in the last race of the Spring Series next weekend.

 

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