Tag: Deltaville

Deltavile Virginia

We had 8 Lasers out for the first day of the Fishing Bay Yacht Club Annual One Design Regatta in light air for two races before a storm came to the area and sent us in.

In the first race I had a good start at the boat, hit the shifts and just led the around the whole course to get a bullet.  The second race was set a bit longer and I messed up the start and wound up behind most of the boats going out to the left.  Halfway up the course I made my way to the right while all of the leaders went left, and I caught some good wind and shifts to the right to round just inside Brad Squires.  Brad had a gear I didn’t have downwind and got ahead and led the rest of the way to the finish.

We were sent in as a storm approached and were in by 2pm.

I did two video experiments today.  One was taking a bunch of time lapse pictures around the club of everyone launching and heading out to the course.  The other experiment was mounting a video camera to the stern of the laser with an extension.  It was a cool view, but was a little shaky.  I’ll have to figure out how to stabilize it a little more.

2013 FBYC AOD

Day 1 Results

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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.

RESULTS | PHOTOS | VIDEO

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The wind started out light for the 8 Lasers at the Fishing Bay Yacht Club Summer Laser Regatta.  We sailed 2 races in light air and then waited a short time for the sea breeze to kick in and gave us a little more solid pressure for another 4 races.

2/28 FBYC Laser Summer RegattaPhoto by Lisa Radtke

I got a great jump on the first race and lead wire-to-wire.  Other highlights include several 2nds including a couple races where I had to claw my way up there from 4-5 at the first windward mark.  I ended up 2nd overall.  Len Guenther was fast and consistent and put up 3 bullets to win the day comfortably.  Blake Kimbrough was a fast starter all day – too fast – he was OCS in 5 of 6 races and in the only race he wasn’t OCS he won.   Despite the restarts he still sailed fast enough to take 3rd overall.

2/28 FBYC Laser Summer RegattaPhoto by Lisa Radtke

The rest of the fleet – Brad, Mike, Rob, Frank, Alain all sailed good races and kept it close and competitive all the way around the course.  Thanks to Tom, Paul and the rest of the race committee for running races for us.  And thanks Lisa Radtke for a few photos.

2/28 FBYC Laser Summer RegattaBlake, Jon, Len

RESULTS

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Saturday was Fishing Bay Yacht Club‘s Summer Seabreeze regatta. We had 7 Flying Scots and 3 Front Runners out. On those Front Runners 4 of the 6 sailors had never been on one before. We did 5 races in 6-9 knots of breeze out of the southeast. Marie Schacht was my crew and we put up 1-2-1-1-2 to narrowly beat out Front Runner guru Matt Braun.

20130727-220316.jpg

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This weekend I sailed aboard Wavelength in the the Southern Bay Leukemia Cup Regatta.  On Saturday we started with a postponement while few storms moved through the area.  An hour later it cleared up and the wind continued to build throughout the day.  We started out with a new No 1 Genoa and we liked the way it was working and how we were able to point. We did well in the first race, had good crew work and maneuvers and finished 4th.   While we were beating a couple faster boats on the water, we were just not able to reel in Afterthought, Double Eagle and Voodoo to be able to correct over them.

7/14 Leukemia CupSunday race 1 start.

By the 2nd race of the day the wind picked up and we switched down to the 2.  Just after starting the wind dropped down for a short time before the sea breeze really started to crank.  By the 2nd downwind we were seeing winds in the low to mid 20’s and along with a few other boats – we elected not to fly a spinnaker.  We had a 4 & 5 on the day to keep us in 4th.

The party was fun and the live charity auction featured one of my prints that raised some money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

On Sunday we pretty much just had light air all day.  We did two races and sailed well, but still weren’t really able to reel in the 3 boats at the head of the pack.   All in all it was a another fun weekend of sailing with the Wavelength team!  Thanks Rob & Steve for having me and if anyone would like to donate to our fundraising effort this link can be used.  Results.

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On Saturday I had the unplanned opportunity to be the PRO (Principle Race Officer) for Fishing Bay Yacht Club‘s Summer Sea Breeze regatta.  I was all set to race a Front Runner, but we didn’t end up having a fleet and my crew Stephen Boling came along to help run race committee.  Now I’ve been on signal boats and race committees a hundred times for everything from club races to national championships – but this was my first time actually being a PRO.  Lucky for me the wind was steady enough not to have to change the course and we were able to get 5 races off for the Flying Scot fleet and all went very well.

Phil Webb, John Wake, Clark Dennison, Len Guenther

Pictures | Results

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Thursday was July 4th and Fishing Bay Yacht Club‘s annual one design long distance race.  I was able to borrow a Front Runner and a co-worker of mine – Stephen Boling came out to crew.  Stephen had never been on a sailboat before.  We headed out, got to practice each maneuver once and then the race started.

Getting ready to go sail

The race started right of the FBYC dock and the first leg took us south out of Fishing Bay 3/5 of the way across the river to the far side of the channel.  We had perfect start, right at the boat, right at the gun and were able to pin some of the other boats to the left side of the course for a bit.  Upwind we picked a nice lane of wind right up the middle of the bay and found ourselves 1st at the windward mark.

Braun family as the rest of the Front Runners overtake us while we dealt with spin problems.

We set  the chute on the 2nd leg which took us due east on a race about a mile to another channel marker.  What we didn’t realize when we first set the chute was that it was very twisted at the top.  After a few boats started to pass us, we had to take it up and down a few times to get the twist out.  By the time we close-reached down to the 1/2 way mark, we were easily 300 yards behind the lead pack of 5 boats.

The fleet just ahead of us by the halfway point.

Sailing the next two upwind legs we had good speed and I picked good angles and we actually passed 3 of the boats. By the finish we were within 20 yards of the 2nd boat over the line. If only we had another 3 miles, we could have contended for the lead. Unfortunately, all 3 of the top boats owed the Flying Scot, sailed by John & Sharon Wake, time and they corrected over us, putting us in 4th overall.

I want to thank the Front Runner fleet for letting me borrow a boat and Stephen Boling for coming out to crew.

Photos | Results

Photos above by Stephen Boling.

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I started the day at Hampton Yacht Club where a team from Fishing Bay Yacht Club was invited to a scrimmage Team Racing Sonars.  We started with a quick recap/overview/planning in a classroom and then the team of 11 FBYC sailors were split into 3 boats for our team and Hampton took the other 3 boats.  We spent a couple hours doing drills and practicing team race maneuvers against the Hampton team.  The wind was in the low to mid teens which made boat handling a little more challenging, particularly for the FBYC sailors who hadn’t had a lot of time together nor a lot of time in Sonars.  But we still were able to put on a good showing and I think it was a very successful scrimmage for both teams.  A big thank you to Gary Bodie and Hampton Yacht Club for having us!

6/22 Hampton Team Race Scrimmage - Gary Bodie explaining the drills.

Immediately after getting off the water in Hampton, I got on the road to Deltaville to sail Fishing Bay Yacht Club‘s Moonlight Regatta on Wavelength.  The start was delayed 30 minutes while some weather approached the area, but never really came near us.  Out on the water we had beautiful sailing conditions with mostly clear skies and a steady 12-15 out of the south.  None of the overcast and occasional rain we had seen in Hampton earlier in the day.

We started at 8pm and sailed out of the Piankatank with the sun setting behind us just a short time later.  I grabbed this shot of Mad Hatter just behind us passing in front of the sunset. Just goes to show that the best pictures don’t necessarily come from the best camera, but from the camera you’ve got. This was a 2-take photo taken with the iphone.  Here’s an alternate version of it on Instagram.

6/22 FBYC Moonlight Race - Mad Hatter sailing through the sunset.

The race went pretty well and we had a good group aboard for sailing at night.  I was jib grinder for the first 3 legs, spin trimmer downwind, and drove the last 2 legs upwind.  We finished around 10:30. While we didn’t make the podium, the ice cream smothered in rum after racing was reward enough.

Results | More photos from today starting here.

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2013 FBYC OD Spring #2_0100

Following a late night at the Richmond NASCAR race I was off to Fishing Bay Yacht Club for the Stew Pot Regatta to sail on Rob Whittemore’s Flying Scot – Patriot.  We had 8 other Flying Scots out with us and 3 Front Runners in 11-15 knots of wind out of the ESE.  The first 3 races were 4/5 mi H course and the last two were a W4 and a G.  We had  good starts, great boat speed and kept to the favored side of the course.  John Wake and his wife Sharon were close competition all day, but we managed to snip them at the line a couple of times.  All in all it was a fun day sailing with Rob and great to get 5 bullets to win the day.

2013 FBYC OD Spring #2_0055

Top 2 photos by Karen Huddle

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