Any posts that contain videos that I’ve created
Saturday at the Chesapeake Bay Laser Masters Championship started out with the wind too light for sailing. So what did we do with 45 Laser Masters sailors while waiting for the wind to fill?
PADDLE BOARD RACES!
Lucky for us the wind filled a short time later and we got to go racing! Regatta Results | Sailing Video
While in Destin Florida for Chris K & Jaimie’s wedding this weekend Chris W and I got into a little Go Karting. Here’s a little video of the collision where the camera on my head bounced on my nose and cut it open leaving a nice gash for the entire weekend. More photos/video etc from the wedding coming in a few days.
With no prospect of wind for the second day of the Fishing Bay Yacht Club Annual One Design Regatta, racing was called off early and yesterday‘s results stand. Being tied for first, it would have been fun to have another race to break the tiebreaker, but we wouldn’t get it and I wound up second after the tie was broken. Congrats to Brad Squires for winning the race that counted and getting it done. Results.
On Saturday I ran the GoPro cameras to do some time lapse around the club. Here’s the video of it all put together:
After awards and sailing we took out a few of the junior opti sailors and their coaches in Lasers and 420s for some fun sailing in the very light winds. I took a friend’s 9-year-old son, who is an experienced opti sailor, out on my Laser and after a few pointers he sailed the boat alone for the first time. He then proceeded in the first race to crush his college-aged coaches. He didn’t do quite as well in the subsequent races, but it was a thrill for him to sail anything other an Opti, even if it was only 4 knots of wind.
Saturday’s Cut Channel Race at Fishing Bay Yacht Club had a bit of everything from the weather. Light air, heavy air, storms, chop, smooth seas, etc. Lud Kimbrough, Mike Karn and I sailed the J/70 Nostalgia in the PHRF-B fleet of 6 boats out of 15 total for the race.
The race took us south and east and then due east across the bay before heading north up the shipping channel and back to the Piankatank. We had a great start and did well on the first upwind and reaching legs. On the 2nd downwind leg out to the channel we made a bad bet on the weather and fell back into the fleet.
After rounding the channel marker to head North we could see storms in the distance but with being so far out into the bay we didn’t have reliable cell service to check the weather. We donned our life jackets and battened down the hatch – we really did this – and prepared for some weather. We were also monitoring VHF 16 instead of the race channel so we could hear ships coming up the channel, etc so we didn’t hear any race announcements that the race was being shortened at the next mark.
Most of the storms stayed away and we could see lightning in the distance. One frontal system did come through and as the wind hit the boats behind us, we quickly executed our emergency chute down procedure to get it in the boat just before we were hit with a 25-30+ knot gust. We rode out the rest of the leg under jib and main still making 6 knots and as we approached the mark we saw Mr. Roberts there and saw the race was being shortened.
We didn’t save our time, but we had fun and got to try something different on a boat none of us had ever done a distance race with. Unfortunately for us, we finished at the farthest point of the course from home, which meant we still needed to sail upwind back home. We definitely didn’t have enough fuel aboard to motor the whole way, plus the boat goes faster under sail anyway. 2 1/2 hours later and after narrowly dodging another squall line and motoring from about 6 miles offshore once the wind died, we made it back to FBYC.
It’s rare that I can get to the river for a weeknight for a sail. Len Guenther was there too and we got to get a little practice in before our races on Sunday at Fishing Bay Yacht Club. What a beautiful sunset!
Traveled to Newport today in preparation for the 159th New York Yacht Club Annual Regatta. I’m sailing with Noel Clinard on his J/70 Loonatictu.
Team New Zealand has their boat docked right next to us at Sail Newport.
We launched the boat and tried to go for a practice sail. By the late afternoon the wind had nearly died so we didn’t get much practice.
We finished the night off with a drive past all of the mansions and dinner at Scales and Shells.
Here’s the entry list for the weekend.
This morning we headed out for the first day of the New York Yacht Club 159th Annual Regatta. Heading out to the course it was amazing sailing past all of the bigger boats including the 12 meters on the way to the course.
We were sailing in area A which was just on the other side of the bridge in an area called Potter’s Cove. Our fleet included 10 other J/70’s. We got to sail one race in breeze before we started a 2nd one and abandoned it when the wind shut off.
A little light (air) reading:
An hour or more later the wind came out of the South and we got two more races in.
Following racing we headed over to the New York Yacht Club for cocktails and dinner.
The forecast for today was for better wind and we got it. Out on the course in the same racing area, just north of the Newport Bridge, we started out with 8 knots out of the south and by the last race we had 12-13.
In the 4 races we had some decent starts and seemed to get a little faster and had better boat work as the day went on. While we didn’t have any great results to show for it – it was fun sailing in the J/70 fleet. And being my first time in Newport it was nice to see the town and New York Yacht Club. Thanks Noel Clinard for having me along for the weekend – it was a pleasure sailing with you, Jerry and Carrie.