I do not. We raced the last two (boats we owned), a bit in PHRF races. And I started sailing racing on a Lightning before I can remember.
I consider myself at most, a sailboat racing voyeur. We're always running into them and I usually sail close to get a look. Like this very hot day last summer. There was very little wind and that wind, was dying. The conditions of 'racing', like these, always come back to me. We hung around for a while, under sail, making good progress. Then a boat wake rolled through and sails started slatting. I remembered the sweating, the blistering sun, the lack of wind, and how long a committee would put up with that before calling the race. We turned the diesel on and put the sun above the awning and made a cool breeze.
We often pick the up club races in the islands. That's always fun to slow down and watch.
Different islands have different one design classes, some over a hundred years old like this North Haven Dinghy, a John Alden design.
A few years ago I got serious and asked my family if they'd be interesting in entering a race. They were game! I started thinking of the races around here that I might enter. I remembered picking a few of them up, under sail in the bay over the years.
Then I remembered, I always ended up sailing in another direction, usually the better sailing direction, and I was glad to be able to do that.
But I love to watch sailboats race. This was a memorable race anchored in Hadley Harbor a few years ago. A beautiful sight.
