I’ve launched my own weather website with data from from various weather buoys around the Chesapeake Bay where I sail. When I’m sailing and want to pull out my phone for a quick check of the weather, I wanted to be able to see it fast so I could get back to sailing. I also wanted to read it easily on a phone and to be able to check multiple buoys without having switch sites. Have a look: http://weather.jdeutsch.com
Some photos of shooting off Fireworks by the Piankatank on Saturday night. All photos taken with a Nikon D7000 Fish eye 10.5mm lens F5 8-10 second exposures ISO 800.
Following Hurricane Arthur’s blowout of our July 4th racing on Friday we ended up with near perfect 8-10 knots and sunny skies for the Fishing Bay Yacht Club Summer Sea Breeze 1 Regatta. Tommy Roper was my crew for his first time on a Front Runner.
The ace Front Runner team of Matt and A.L. Braun were back for this regatta and swept all 4 races. The Garrett clan of Waddy and Parker sharing the helm with Caroline crewing just seemed to edge us out downwind to take 4 second places on the day. The racing was close and we didn’t make any major mistakes, we just couldn’t hang with the other two boats.
By the last race we had pretty much locked in 3rd place so I handed the tiller to Tommy who got to skipper his first race in a double-handed boat.
Hurricane Arthur spoiled our plans to do the Annual Long Distance Race at Fishing Bay Yacht Club. I was going to be sailing a Front Runner but the storm rolled through in the morning hours and so the racing was cancelled. The Hurricane was well east of us and all we got was some rain and wind for a few hours. We never saw winds much above 40.
Once the rain subsided much of the rest of the day was spent hanging out and doing a little bit a boat work. By the afternoon the sun was out and it was a beautiful day albeit still a little windy. We went for a boat ride, enjoyed the 4th of July party and band at the club and then went out for another boat ride to watch fireworks 360-degrees all around.
We started the July 4 weekend with some J/70 racing at Fishing Bay Yacht Club. We had 6 boats out in 12-16 knots of wind for a few races. I was on Nostalgia with Blake Kimbrough, Julia Page and Tommy Roper.
This photo was right after we finally got a correct spinnaker set. It only took us 4 laps to get it right. On the plus side we got a lot better at outside gybes.
Saturday was the Cut Channel Race at Fishing Bay Yacht Club and I was aboard Double Eagle with Sam Mitchener and 7 others for the race. We couldn’t have asked for much better weather with 10-20 knots out of the East with sunny skies for the 29nm course. We were among 2 other boats in the PHRF-A fleet and 18 total boats in the race.
We had a good start down by the pin right alongside the other J-109 Afterthought. The first half of the race was a beat and for the first 2 miles Afterthought inched ahead of us to where they were 5 lengths ahead of us as we turned around C and headed for mark L. As the wind built we had a better sail selection and a little more weight and were within a couple boat lengths by the time we got to L.
Afterthought crossing us on the way to Q:
From mark L we kept going south while Afterthought tacked and went North as we both made our way east across the bay to mark Q. The current made all the difference pushing us closer to the mark and we were .8 mi ahead at Q. As the wind eased and the conditions began to favor Afterthought for the 2nd half of the race they chewed some of that back and we crossed the finish line with a 3:15 minute lead and won our class and had the fastest corrected time of the whole fleet.
I ended up driving upwind and the reach for about 40 minutes which was good to give Sam a break and to see how the sails were affecting the trim. Mayo, Bonnie, Ed, Matt L, Chris T, Holly F sailed well together and were fun to sail with. All in all it was a good race and a good result – putting Double Eagle into contention later this year for the long distance series.
Our Course (blue) and our track (red dotted):
We had a great night of J70 sailing at Fishing Bay Yacht Club. With 7 boats out we got 2 nice long races in 15-18 with some nice swells from the east wind. Thanks to Lud and Nostalgia Racing for having me along.
Such a great time to play some soccer at the end of the day. Literally put blood, sweat and tears into this… after I got hit with a soccer ball while filming and the camera cut my forehead, and tears when I missed the sudden death penalty kick putting my team out of the final. Was a fun video to make and there’s never been a better time for me to start a rap career on the side.
This was the scene as the sun was setting behind the 288 bridge on the James River this evening. Such a nice night on a weeknight for a cruise!
Having not planned on being in Deltaville this weekend I was a late add to Wavelength for the Moonlight Regatta following my Laser sail in the afternoon. The weather was perfect for a night race – comfortable temperatures, clear skies and 12-19 knots of wind out of the north east.
We got a pretty reasonable start and were 2nd around the top mark behind Double Eagle. On the 2nd leg out to mark E, Double Eagle went pretty low and allowed us to slip by while the Tartan 40 Nereid just waterlined us in the chop and was half a length ahead of us to leeward at E. For some strange reason Nereid went below the mark, we didn’t, but we couldn’t turn right to go to G because they were there. Eventually it was sorted out and Nereid went back to re-round while we led the fleet to G only to be overrun by Double Eagle once they caught up. Below is a photo of Nereid (right) going back to the mark, while Double Eagle tracks us down.
From G to J was a close reach up into the Rappahannock River with the current coming right on our nose. I drove about a mile and a half of the leg before we turned to go back to the Piankatank. We put the chute up just before F and gybed around it. We had a bit of a trouble with the jibe before we got settled to head for the finish. About halfway down the leg to the finish our topping lift broke. We took down the spinnaker and sailed bare-headed while we got the genoa sorted and hoisted. We came so close to winning the A fleet… Double Eagle corrected to 34 seconds ahead of us leaving us in 2nd overall.
Below is the course. The marks as sailed are labeled Moon Start-Moon-E-G-J-B(finish). The dotted red line is the actual course we sailed.
