Sweet; Bitter

After two weeks out of the water finally got out sailing on Saturday to rebuild confidence after the tragedy of loosing a mast at the last race. I also wanted to ensure that the mast was setup correctly with a new sail combination for the MG14 class configuration. After setting the mast to a satisfactory rake and shroud tension took out Todd who owns the only other MG14 boat in the club. The wind was a fresh 8 - 12 knots and very comfortable on the river. After a half an hour with the confidence renewed and the tide almost full I decided to head out to the open sea beyound the river mouth. With the tide pushing in strongly and a small 1 metre swell we left the relative comfort of the river out into the open sea where the wind was fresher but more steady than in the river. It was hard work but very exilarating pushing over the swells and through the wind chop as we sailed to windward. When we had got about a kilometer offshore I turned back and we reached back into the river.

After sailing for 2 hours we decided after rounding the upcoming port channel bouy that we would call it a day. As Todd removed the Whisker Pole for the bouy rounding I was distracted from my task to give him some assistance and hit the bouy square on. Fortunately we hit the rubber bumper and suffered only some minor chips but it certainly tainted what had been a great days' sailing.

Next morning was an even nicer looking day with the wind backing off slightly to 6 - 10 knots. First up were boat repairs and after planning to get on the water at 10:00am with Jill for some much needed practice finally made it by 12:15. Fortunately one of the other NS sailors had taken Jill out for an hour which helped to ease the anticiaption and nerves. After doing some basic manouvres there was just enough time for a quick snack before briefing at 1:00pm.

The course looked really interesting and was a figure eight with returns on each end. The starts for Championship races are always very competitive and crowded and taking a fairly conservative and safe approach meant we got away probably 20 seconds behind the pack. We quickly regained some ground after the first beat and were within a couple of boat lenghts of Jason and Todd who would be our nearest competition for entire race. We managed to get in front of Todd after arounding the third mark with the delays he experienced in setting his kite but Jason got away from us and we were unable to make up the the distance between us over the race. We did manage to put some time on Todd but when we rounded the last second last mark I sailed straight to the finish instead of upto the last mark. After crossing the line twice and not getting a hooter I realised when I saw Todd sailing upto the last mark that I had made a mistake. I then set a course for the last mark and we ended up finally getting our hooter 3 minutes behind Todd. After having a great day of sailing in perfect weather on a great course the final mistake wasn't that hard to get over. At least we had finished the course and had made significant progress in developing Jill's sailing ability and confidence.