We had the usual PCYC burger and beer in the tent by the clubhouse.
We listened to the skippers meeting and the weather briefing by Ron Bianchi.
Then off the dock to the race course.
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| Boats leaving the harbour for the race |
Winds were 4-6 knots from the SE and fluky at the start. We had a reasonable start on starboard in with all boats in the IRC classes (second start). Knowing that the winds were going to be light all night, and pickup at 3 or 4 in morning, we wanted to stay close to the rhumb line.
We flew the new chute pretty much the entire way to the Burlington Mark. Winds were very light, but we clawed slowly down the coast. Winds died down to 2-3 knots, so we headed into shore to try and pickup some winds coming off the shore created by the difference in temperature between the land and water. This helped us a lot, and we were passing boats left and right. We seemed to be making gains on the boats that stayed offshore.
At about 3am near Oakville, the winds died completely, so we dropped the hanging spinnaker. We still were doing 0.9 knots towards the mark. At some point in the night, we had ripped the bottom panels on the new spinnaker on the pulpit during a gybe. Will be an easy repair.
The new winds from the SW didn't come until 4:30am and we screamed under spinnaker and gybed around the Burlington weather buoy at 5am. There were a couple dozen boats ahead of us who had stayed off shore and got the new breeze first.
It was now a rhumb line drag race to Niagara. In 16-18 knots of breeze from the SW, with the apparent wind angle at 120 degrees, perfect for ACE. We were screaming directly towards Niagara between 9 and 10 knots the entire time!
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| Great Photo 13 miles from Niagara 10 knots constant speed |
We rounded Niagara buoy at 8:15am, and found ourselves on a close reach with #1 doing 9 knots comfortably. Apparent wind was at 75 degree, so wee could not fly a symmetric chute. We toyed with hoisting Still Time's asymmetric chute, but we had never tried it and were doing well with the genoa. passing many boats in front of us.
When we were 11 miles from the finish, we heard 515, an IMX 38 skippered by HYC's Jim McGinness radio in to the race committee that he was 5 miles from the finish. Five Fifteen was the winner of our class and 2nd overall in the IRC fleet.
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| Kewl shot from the cabin @9 knots |
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| Jenny flying the chute |
We were elated with our finish. We bore off away from the finish line, started the motor, and dropped the main. Put the motor in gear and it stalled. Tried it a couple of times. Had to hoist the main again to take us away from the mouth of the harbour. As we cleaned up the lines we realized that the spinnaker guy had wrapped itself around the prop,
We made the decision to sail back to the National, taking a mooring ball, and dive underneath to free the rope.
On the way to National, a couple of sailing training vessels came out of EYC under full sail.
We altered course to take their stern:
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| AWESOME |
Once at National, we rafted up against Mike's Impromptu and I donned a wetsuit and mask:
Took two dives to free the line from the prop.
We spent about an hour cleaning up the boat.
We were pleased how we sailed the last two legs. Our decision to go inshore on the first leg to find wind was the difference. The boats who stayed offshore got the breeze first.
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| Click for larger version |
We were the 7th of 9 boats in our class to finish, 8th of 9 in corrected time.
12th of 14 in the IRC fleet overall.
Trip Odometer: 72.74 miles
Moving Average: 5.0 knots
Max Speed: 10.4 knots
Google Earth Track: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/12535935/Still%20Time/2015/20150529.kmz
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