2016 J/70 Spring Cleaning
Spring cleaning day for the J/70. Test mounted the new mast travel carrier and gave the boat a good scrubbing to be ready for the season!
Tom & Jamie’s Wedding
The genesis for the trip to Lake Norman was the wedding of my college buddy Tom to his fiance Jaime. Being the reception was on Lake Norman so close to the yacht club I was able to sail Saturday, attend the reception and sail again on Sunday.
It was a beautiful venue at a home on the lake and it was great catching up with old friends and celebrating with Tom, Jamie and their family and friends. Congrats Tom & Jamie!
2016 Lake Norman Yacht Club Lightning Spring Championship: Sunday
Day 2 at the Lake Norman Yacht Club Spring Lightning Invitational was to see lighter winds – but we were pleasantly surprised with 5-8 knots for our first race. Steve, Jeff and I had another good start and stayed in the top 5 all the way around the course making gains near the top of the final upwind and finished with a 2nd. That gave us a few point lead over 2nd place Greg Fisher going into the final race.
As the 2nd race started the wind began to die. We took a conservative approach up the middle and boats on both sides found more wind and rounded ahead. We were around 8th at the top mark – picked up a couple boats downwind and then found the wind even lighter and more fickle on the 2nd upwind. We picked some shifts and caught some boats and even crossed ahead of Greg. But he found wind on the other side of the course and wound up finishing 3 boats ahead of us and we fell back to 6th as we reached the top mark for a shortened finish.
It wouldn’t be until we were arriving at the awards that we found out that we had tied Greg Fisher for 1st and we won the tiebreaker on account of having won 2 of the races. A great result for a pick up team in a borrowed boat against some good sailors. Thanks again Steve and Jeff Hayden for having me along and Bill for all of the hospitality at Lake Norman Yacht Club!
2016 Lake Norman Yacht Club Lightning Spring Championship: Saturday
A fun sailing opportunity came together for me this weekend while I was going to be in town for Tom & Jamie’s wedding – I was able to sail at Lake Norman Yacht Club at their Spring Lightning Regatta. Bill Wiggins set me up with Steve and Jeff Hayden who were coming up from Florida and needed a 3rd.
I haven’t sailed a Lightning since sometime in the early 1990’s when I would ride my bike down to Chautauqua Lake Yacht Club and jump on a boat for their Wednesday night series. Steve and Jeff are great sailors and it was easy to fit right in with them on the boat. I did the bow and while I probably wasn’t the quickest nor the most graceful gybing the pole – I don’t think I slowed us down any.
In the first race of the day we had a great start right at the line at the gun. From there we just picked some shifts and found ourselves at the top mark in first- from there we extended around the course.
In the second race we had a reasonable start – but other boats hugged the left even more and we found ourselves around 6-8 at the top mark. The wind was coming up a little more from the 6-8 in the first race to where we were definitely sitting out to balance the boat. On the second upwind we picked some good shifts and made it to 3rd through to the finish.
The 3rd race wasn’t as good to us on the start. We were near the back of the pack at the top mark, but worked on picking off boats on every leg with good boat speed and managed 6th.
For the 4th and final race of the day – we again had a good start. Got to the top mark in the top 3, held our position downwind and pulled ahead on the next upwind winning the race and putting us solidly in front of the 19-boat fleet on the first day.
2016 FBYC Opening Day
This weekend should have been Fishing Bay Yacht Club‘s Opening Day Race followed by a J/70 clinic on Sunday – but the weather conspired to have it cancelled. With no sailing to do and only a Blessing of the Fleet and party to attend – it became a work weekend and thus the J/70 that was not yet rigged was packed and hauled to Richmond.
While at home it was easy to get a couple projects done:
- Trailer visibility
- Aft engine storage cradle
- Dock box vents
2016 Easter Laser Regatta: Friday
Friday I completed the last bit of the drive to Austin and after a work meeting during the morning in town, headed over to Austin Yacht Club for some practice ahead of the Easter Laser Regatta. This is an event that had been on my bucket list some time and everything worked out to be able to do it this year.
Late in the afternoon, me and Forest Atkins, from the Dallas Laser Fleet, headed out for some practice. The wind was a perfect 10-12 with mostly flat water. This was my second day out with the MkII sail and nearly 5 months since the last Laser regatta I sailed. And it showed. I spent most of the first hour just remembering what the boat felt like and getting the new sail tuned correctly. The more we sailed the more speed I found. 2 hours later we headed in and then met up with some more of the Dallas Laser Fleet members for dinner nearby.
2016 NVMYC Spring Series
No Quarter RG65 sailed its first regatta at the Northern Virginia Model Yacht Club Spring Series on Lake Anne in Reston VA. It was early and the wind was light and fluky, so 9 boats made for 7 fun and interesting racing. I had some moments of brilliance as well as some complete misses. Took me a couple races to dial the boat in a bit. There were a couple boats that felt a smidge faster, but there was still a lot of bad sailing that moved me back. With more experience I’ll get a little better going into the first race day at the Richmond Model Yacht Club next weekend.
2016 March: Dallas
Was back in Dallas for another weekend. Highlights include the Bush Library, Perot Science Museum, Dallas Arboretum & Bishop Arts area.
2016 Las Vegas
Was recently in Vegas on a family trip. Got to see more of the sights on both the strip and downtown.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BCRWfsPq-3y/
RG65 No Quarter
Added another boat to the fleet. This No Quarter is an RG65 model yacht. It’s about 25″ long and 60″ tall from the bottom of the keel to the top of the mast. I got a used boat from a member of the Richmond Model Yacht Club. After fitting a radio to it and getting a few other things readied, I got to join 6 others today for some practice. It was a bit light and we only sailed about 30 minutes before we got rained out. Thanks Rob S for helping get me going and I’m looking forward to some more racing this spring.