Tag: Deltaville

Deltavile Virginia

Saturday started out as a nice day for sailboat racing at Fishing Bay Yacht Club for the 2nd Sea Breeze regatta before storms chased us off the course.  I sailed in a 3-boat Front Runner fleet with crew Anna Matchett against Mark Stephens/Matt Braun & Kevin Cross/Matt Lambert.

In the first race we had a great start and won the boat shutting the other two boats out and forcing them to start behind us.  Up the first beat we had good speed and worked the shifts on the right side of the course.

We made a few crosses just ahead of the other two boats but lost out to Mark who snuck ahead of us right at the mark rounding. Downwind Mark played the middle while we went hard right.  The 2nd upwind leg was a little flukier.  We again played the middle right while Mark played the left and Kevin went up the left.  At the top mark we were in 1st, Kevin came way back to round in 2nd just ahead of Mark.  The final downwind was a drag race with us about 4 boat-lengths ahead of Mark and Kevin and in the end Mark edged Kevin out at the finish for 3 and some close racing.

Right at the end of the race Mark had a gear failure so it was just at two boat race for the 2nd race.  We had a terrible start, were slow crossing the line and lost a lot of ground to Kevin.  Halfway up the beat we heard on the radio that the course was being shortened so we did our best to play the shifts, but knew we were being sent in and a 2 was good enough to win the day.

Thanks Anna for coming sailing with me today.  And thanks David Hinkle and the race committee for running races for us.

RESULTS | PHOTOS | VIDEO

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What the wind left us wanting for on Saturday was delivered on Sunday.  Perfect sailing conditions with 10-14 knot breezes out of the south west and comfortable temperatures and partly cloudy skies.

Three more races were sailed.  We did as well as we could and didn’t make too many mistakes.  We still couldn’t hang with the faster boats and found ourselves 5-6-5 on the day.  All in all it was a fun regatta and nice to sail with Rob Whittet, Steve Utley and the rest of the Wavelength Crew as we helped raise money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

Photos | Results | Video

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The first day of the Leukemia Cup Regatta got off to a bit of a slow start when racing was postponed on the water for almost 3 hours.  We had a couple teases where it looked to fill and thankfully we didn’t have triple-digit heat while we sat around.

We finally started a race and we had a good start at the boat with only Double Eagle between us and the boat. Below us were a couple J/105s.

We worked our way out to the left as we went up the course. All in all we sailed well, didn’t make any mistakes and got around the course cleanly. Unfortunately, we still couldn’t catch the 2 j109s or Voodoo 2 and settled for 4th.

Two of the j105s didn’t have such a hot first downwind leg. They were just behind us when one of them tried to gybe behind the other and wound up colliding. One boat put their spinnaker pole right into the cockpit behind the driver and as the boats tangled it sheared off the rear pulpit before the boats came to a stop and were untangled. There were no injuries but the damaged boat won’t be racing tomorrow.

With one race complete it was too late for another one and we headed in.

Following racing we boated over to the Deltaville Maritime Museum for a great dinner and entertainment.

And one of my photos was in the live auction raising money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.  It was cool to be featured alongside a couple of John Barbour prints.

Photos | Results

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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.

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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.

7/3 J/70 Fri Night Series

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.

7/3 J/70 Fri Night Series
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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:
Afterthought

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.

Pictures | Results

Our Course (blue) and our track (red dotted):

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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.

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Results | Photos

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I spent most of today at Fishing Bay Yacht Club putting the new boat together.  After 4 hours and 3 trips to West Marine and I had it all tricked out like I wanted and ready to sail.

6/14 drilling holes in and tricking out the new boat.

6/14 about to launch the new boat for the first time.

What really surprised me when I was sailing was how much stiffer the mast seemed.  I haven’t sailed many boats and am pretty used to the feel of the old boat.  I’m guessing after 17 years the old mast has been flexed so many times it’s lost a bit of stiffness.  Couple the stiffer mast with control lines that are just a little thinner than I’m used to and I really felt like a wimp trying to crank everything in.  I’m sure it’ll loosen up a bit as I get used to it.  The other difference was the all Holt-Allen fittings which were just a little different than the Harken ones I’m used to.  I’m not sure yet which I prefer, but I’m sure I’ll be able to tell in time.

6/14 first sail in the new boat.

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