The first real race for Ward and I was exciting to say the least! Too bad only 4 boats were entered. We'd like to see more. Perhaps the weather forecast affected the numbers. The forecast was for 20 knots from the south at the start and building in the afternoon. Another typical Barnegat Bay Saturday afternoon!
After sailing around before the race with full mainsail, we decided about 8 minutes before the actual start to reef. Got that done with about a minute to spare before the 5 minute start sequence. We had our genoa rolled up a little bit as well. Start was at noon sharp and the race was 2 laps around a triangle with the start and finish half way between the upwind and downwind marks. I think the total distance was about 7 miles. We finished in total elapsed time right at 1 hour 30 minutes. Our corrected time was 1 hour 7 minutes & change.
The new Tartan 40 finished in 56 minutes and obviously blew the rest of us away. But it was really tight between the other 3 boats! A Catalina 34 finished just ahead of us by 1:30 and a 1970 Morgan 30 finished behind us by a few minutes. On corrected time, all 3 of us were within less than a minute! Thunderbird scored 2nd overall and the Morgan was 3rd, so the Catalina was completely flipped in the order.
That 50 year-old Morgan looks like it just came off the showroom, BTW, and that is no exaggeration. The gelcoat on the coachroof and deck and the brightwork gleams like it has been under a cover indoors for it's entire life.
We made a few mistakes on the upwind legs that cost us. The Catalina was at least a minute late to the start so they definitely paid for that. The Morgan also had start troubles and if not for that they would have corrected ahead of us, surely.
Ward and I were pretty much on time for the start, matching pretty well with the Tartan. I'm learning that if I keep close to that guy, I can't go wrong. That pretty much made the difference for us! On the reaches, we were fast, matching or ever so slightly bettering the Catalina 34, even with their waterline length. We were ahead of them for the first lap all the way around, but gave it up on the long upwind leg. We recovered distance again on the next lap during the reaches. The Morgan came close to us at the end of the long upwind leg, but they finally had to duck us when we crossed on starboard just before the mark. They were on port and just could not make it ahead of us so they had to duck. We then put a lot of distance between us on the reaches (and gained ever so slightly on the Catalina, we think) and finished more strongly on the last upwind leg than we were doing on the previous upwind legs. Overall, we could tell that the race was very tight just about all the way around so it was a lot of fun. We were very happy at the end, even before we knew the results, because it was so much fun!
Our 6 mile journey home, though, was about the worst boat ride I ever experienced! Let's just say that when winds built to about 30 to 40 knots, it wasn't any fun at all. That's another story!
After sailing around before the race with full mainsail, we decided about 8 minutes before the actual start to reef. Got that done with about a minute to spare before the 5 minute start sequence. We had our genoa rolled up a little bit as well. Start was at noon sharp and the race was 2 laps around a triangle with the start and finish half way between the upwind and downwind marks. I think the total distance was about 7 miles. We finished in total elapsed time right at 1 hour 30 minutes. Our corrected time was 1 hour 7 minutes & change.
The new Tartan 40 finished in 56 minutes and obviously blew the rest of us away. But it was really tight between the other 3 boats! A Catalina 34 finished just ahead of us by 1:30 and a 1970 Morgan 30 finished behind us by a few minutes. On corrected time, all 3 of us were within less than a minute! Thunderbird scored 2nd overall and the Morgan was 3rd, so the Catalina was completely flipped in the order.
That 50 year-old Morgan looks like it just came off the showroom, BTW, and that is no exaggeration. The gelcoat on the coachroof and deck and the brightwork gleams like it has been under a cover indoors for it's entire life.
We made a few mistakes on the upwind legs that cost us. The Catalina was at least a minute late to the start so they definitely paid for that. The Morgan also had start troubles and if not for that they would have corrected ahead of us, surely.
Ward and I were pretty much on time for the start, matching pretty well with the Tartan. I'm learning that if I keep close to that guy, I can't go wrong. That pretty much made the difference for us! On the reaches, we were fast, matching or ever so slightly bettering the Catalina 34, even with their waterline length. We were ahead of them for the first lap all the way around, but gave it up on the long upwind leg. We recovered distance again on the next lap during the reaches. The Morgan came close to us at the end of the long upwind leg, but they finally had to duck us when we crossed on starboard just before the mark. They were on port and just could not make it ahead of us so they had to duck. We then put a lot of distance between us on the reaches (and gained ever so slightly on the Catalina, we think) and finished more strongly on the last upwind leg than we were doing on the previous upwind legs. Overall, we could tell that the race was very tight just about all the way around so it was a lot of fun. We were very happy at the end, even before we knew the results, because it was so much fun!
Our 6 mile journey home, though, was about the worst boat ride I ever experienced! Let's just say that when winds built to about 30 to 40 knots, it wasn't any fun at all. That's another story!
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