2013 Annapolis NOOD Regatta: Friday

We had as good of conditions as we could have asked for on the first day of racing at the Annapolis NOOD Regatta.  Sailing in the J/109 fleet aboard Afterthought we had a pretty good day going 3-2-5 and ending up 3rd in the 7-boat fleet.  We sailed on the southern-most course by Tolly Point and had winds building through the 10-17+ knot range.

In race one we had a tough start and had to tack out.  We were DFL around the windward mark.  We enjoyed watching that on the big screen at the race party knowing we made some smart moves on the rest of the race to claw our way up to a 3rd.

In the 2nd race we got a great start and picked the first upwind well and just extended the entire race.  Rush was just ahead of us and while we could almost hang with them, we certainly weren’t closing on them.

For the 3rd race we had another good start and for this race the fleet stayed bunched on the first windward leg.  We were 3 or 4 downwind and then on the 2nd upwind we ended up on the wrong side of a shift and dropped to 6th.  Picked up on boat downwind to finish 5th putting us into 3rd overall – 3 points out of 2nd and 5 points ahead of 4th.

Tomorrow we’re expecting a little lighter winds and a chance to move up a bit.

Some of the sailors from Fishing Bay Yacht Club.