A few years ago, while racing, the owner of the boat (which has since become my boat) was on the foredeck attempting to stow the spinnaker pole immediately after a take-down of the huge symmetrical chute. I was at the helm and witnessed his actions. We were actually doing pretty well at this point, getting ready to round the leeward mark and head back upwind to the finish line.
The owner unclipped the pole’s topping lift, downhaul line and all sheets/guys. He had the pole grasped with both hands, intending to carry it a few feet aft and stow it in the chocks/brackets mounted on the port stanchions. As he started to reach out with the horizontal pole, it slipped out of his grasp like a slippery, slimy wet fish and was launched overboard like a wimpy javelin. It went vertical before before hitting the lake surface and bobbed up and down upright as it apparently was filled with air.
From the helm, some 30 feet aft of this spectacle, I smiled but also gasped as I watched a c. 16’ aluminum pole, costing about $2k, bob up and down like a navigational buoy as we continued sailing past it.
As we continued forward, I continued to watch the still-bobbing pole get closer and closer to me. Without any hesitation—or sense—I let go of the wheel and leapt overboard in an attempt to grab the still-floating pole which appeared just a few feet off the port side. The boat kept moving and I grabbed mightily with open arms as I descended in the vicinity of the wayward pole.
Needless to say, my 250 lbs and gravity pulled me down many several feet below the surface, given that I jumped feet first off the aft quarter of a boat deck sitting some 5 or 6 feet above the water’s surface. Also, needless to say, I never touched or saw the pole as it apparently chose to shoot straight down like a falling javelin roughly at the same time as I attempted to reach out and grab it in my arms.
Once I finally made it back to the surface, I realized that not only had I lost my mind and the elusive swimming spinnaker pole but also my contact lenses and my ride. The crew had apparently been more mesmerized by the unexpected spectacle of the otherwise quiet, conservative, fully-clothed helmsman suddenly jumping overboard mid-race than I had been by the dropped pole. As they returned to reality, they turned around to retrieve me, as I now bobbed up and down treading water in the middle of the race course.
So, all total, I lost a $2k spinnaker pole, my contact lenses, my mind and an otherwise good race all in the matter of a few minutes. I did, however, end up with a great sailing story and a lot of laughs, then and to this day, about what might be important enough to make me relinquish the helm in a good race.