Deltavile Virginia
On Sunday Mike Toms and I ran a clinic for a dozen Laser sailors at Fishing Bay Yacht Club. Most of the group was new to sailing or at least new to the Laser and we spent most of the time going over the boat parts, rigging and basic maneuver techniques on a Laser. Then we took out about 7 boats in nearly no wind to putter around for an hour. Pictures.
Saturday’s Offshore Spring Series #3 at Fishing Bay Yacht Club wasn’t the best weather day. We did one race in very light wind against a stiff current for the first leg. The second race was abandoned after the wind died and many boats anchored to hold position on the ‘upwind’. Still in 3rd for the Series.
Saturday was a beautiful day for racing and Wavelength had a great day at Fishing Bay Yacht Club’s Offshore Spring Series #2. We had good boat speed, good crew work and manged to go 3-2-1-4 in 4 races putting us into 3rd overall for the series. Results.
Photo: Andrea Winner
Sailing continued on Sunday with a a string of 3rd places by Wavelength in the 3 races on the 1st day of the Fishing Bay Yacht Club Offshore Spring Series. Results.
Photo by Andrea Winner.
Got the sailing season off to a great start on Saturday with the Opening Day Regatta at Fishing Bay Yacht Club sailing aboard the C&C37 Wavelength. We did one 12.5 mile race out around the channel buoys to the entrance of the Rappahannock River and back. We did some great sailing which included a spinnaker peel and managed to finish 2nd in some very close racing – only 36 seconds separated the top 4 boats on corrected time. Results and Pictures.
Fishing Bay Yacht Club‘s Laser Frostbite Regatta was the last sailing event of the year for the club and the last sailing event of the year for me as well. We had nice winds about 5-8 out of the north east. It was cool, but sunny and comfortable with a full set of layers on. Having not sailed the Laser in 6 weeks I was pretty inconsistent on the water today. Won 3 races, but wound up 3rd after some deep finishes were factored in. Kudos to Ron Thompson and Michael Moore who both put up top 3 finishes in every race to finish first and second. It was a great day of racing and it was nice having the Hampton Roads sailors come join us.
Results are here.
With that event my sailing for 2011 is complete. I finished the year having sailed 54 days. Up 5 days from last year.
This weekend Fishing Bay Yacht Club hosted the 30th Chesapeake Bay Laser Masters Championship for Laser sailors 35 years of age and old. Since I don’t yet meet the requirements to sail, I’ve been made the event chairman. The event went off without a hitch and 36 sailors participated. The RC did a fabulous job getting 7 races in, including 3 in 20+ knots of wind on Saturday. Alain’s pork Ossobuco was fantastic as all of his meals were. I just want to thank everyone who helped out and all of the sailors who came.
Results and photos have been posted. Here are a few of my favorite photos:
The weather for Sunday at Fishing Bay Yacht Club started out a little questionable. The wind was blowing 20-25 out of the North at the buoy at the point. There were 5 of us there to sail and we all decided to take radials out. We raced inside Fishing Bay in winds in the teens and the Radial sails made for good close racing without any of us being over powered and having to fight the boat.
Ron Thompson and I traded for the lead throughout the races today. Richard Biggs was not far behind pouncing on any mistakes we made. With shifty winds in Fishing Bay there were plenty of passing lanes by picking the right shifts both upwind and down.
After 5 races in about 2 hours with off-and-on rain we called it day and retired to the clubhouse for chilli. All-in-all it was a fun day of sailing and I had to work hard to finish 1-1-2-1-1. I’m glad this weekend went how it did and I’m even more ready to head up to SSA next weekend for the Crab Claw regatta.
*Photo by Lud Kimbrough
Saturday I sailed in Fishing Bay Yacht Club’s Smith Point Race aboard the Farr 37 Excitation. It was a 57 mile race out of the Piankatank River, east across the bay and then north near the mouth of the Potomac River and then back to the entrance to Jackson Creek.
It took about 13 hours to sail. The first 2 1/2 hours were in little to no wind. From the start most of the fleet continue on starboard towards the mouth of the Rappahannock before tacking towards our mark. We spent our time in the light wind sailing on port along shore and out of the current. We picked the layline pretty well from over 10 miles out and were first around the mark. Being the furthest south and the first to catch the sea breeze certainly helped.
Aboard Excitation
We led for a little while longer, but soon the faster J109, Afterthought, passed us heading downwind as we sailed North up the bay to Smith Point. It was this leg where the sun set and the wind increased into the mid-teens. After rounding Smith Point around 11pm we slogged upwind for another 3 1/2 hours to the finish.
Afterthought passing us downwind as the sun set.
That was the longest offshore race I’ve ever sailed and doing most of the driving upwind was a good experience. In the end we finished 2nd – only a minute and 43 seconds out of 1st place. We had a good crew, ate well, and we all enjoyed the trip. Thanks Mayo Tabb for taking me along!
Fishing Bay Yacht Club hosted another great Annual Regatta with some good Laser sailing and plenty of wind which is pretty uncharacteristic for FBYC’s annual regatta in the middle of August. 17 of the 114 boats at the regatta were Lasers and 8 were sailing standard rigs. The Lasers were on a course set in the Piankatank River just outside of Fishing Bay along with the Albacores and Windmills.
All of our races were W2s with .7 mile legs on a slightly pin favored line. In the first race I failed to port tack the fleet and ended up fouling Steve Wirt just moments after the start. I had to do a few penalty turns putting me just behind the entire fleet. By the windward mark I caught up to 3rd with boats all around me. I caught a boat on each of the next two legs and held on for the final downwind leg to the finish.
By the second race the wind had built to the upper teens with gusts into the low twenties. The first leg of this race was a drag race upwind between Frank Murphy and I. At the first mark I rounded just ahead of him and shortly after the rounding he death rolled downwind. That was a wake up call for me to sail a little more conservatively and I stayed out front to get a bullet in this race.
By the time we were starting the 3rd race, the outer course with Flying Scots, Front Runners, Hamptons, Typhoons, and San Juans and already been adjourned for the day having only sailed one race. I think the conditions on the outside sailing area were really putting a beating on the sailors and the race committee.
I botched the start of the 3rd race and basically had to park my boat at the pin while I let Brad Squires, who timed the start perfectly, sail by on starboard. Once I got going again I had good speed to get back out front and lead the way around the course. As I was rounding the final windward mark to the finish, I eased the boom out, but my mast didn’t rotate, poping the 3 rivets holding the gooseneck to the mast. I held on to get me through the finish line and the minute I turned to reach into the club, the goosneck popped off. With no more races for the day, I was thankful that if was going to break that it broke when it did.
Back on shore we packed everything, cleaned up and enjoyed some drinks in the pavilion before dinner and later drinks.
On Sunday the first start was a at 10. Lasers were the 3rd start so I left the dock at 9:40 and arrived at the course just before 10. Turns out I was the only Laser that left the dock. When I got to the course the RC told us to go in and that racing was abandoned onshore. All of the other Lasers had been held before launching. They postponed us due to some approaching storms in the area. The storms never did come and the wind was beautiful all morning and late afternoon and we never did get sent back out to race.
With 3 bullets in 3 races I won the FBYC Annual Regatta for the second year in a row. All in all it was a fun regatta and I’m sorry my summer sailing has come to an end for the year.
1st Jon Deutsch (FBYC), 2nd Jeff Moore (SMSA), 3rd Mike Toms (FBYC)