Interclub 4 from Mojo.
We met up early at the boat yard to replace a broken halyard on Mojo. We slacked the rig and moved the mast forward. Dan got into the harness, while Chris and I ran the hoist line and safety backup line. We ran the feeder then attached the new halyard. Dan stayed up top the whole time then we rolled him down. We got the rig back in line and then it was off to the hoist to launch. We got into the water and began to motor up the Estuary. Hoisting the sails we were greeted with a freshening breeze and made our way to the start area.
After about 20 minutes we decided to put a reef in the main. It was about 3 minutes to go when we had everything ready. The gun went off and we were racing. Starting about 3rd in the class we started the way back up to the top. As we started the upwind leg we found a clutch had slipped and we needed to lower the dagger board. A quick hitch to unload the board and we were back in it. Several tacks had us in striking distance of the lead. The other F25C was out front and we knew we had to sail well to catch up. We crossed the F27 and called our line to the mark. We were now the second boat to the top mark.
The first downwind we chose to not fly the spin. The wind was up and with a rookie crew the skipper called for a reach down. We were doing well reaching down till 2/3 of the way down. The wind lightened up and kept shifting. We lost all our positions and we were the last tri to reach the downwind mark. We were a bit dejected but had a long race still to go and we made the turn upwind.
The second upwind we were getting the boat sailing well. Chris was driving, with Dan running the pit, while I was tacking the jib then becoming rail meat. We had good boat speed and we were making distance up the fleet. Picking lines through the monohulls and trying to get lines on the other trimarans. We were now back near the front of the pack. We caught a few nice lifts and rounded 4th at the top mark.
The second downwind we launched the spin and started to eat up some distance. We ran deep in the puffs and had to maneuver to around the ship. The boat was really sailing well and Chris and Dan were making it work. A couple jibes we had issues with over sheeting on my part but we still moved back to second at the mark. With Dan bagging the spin I released the tack and halyard. I moved over and brought the jib in to the upwind position. We rolled up and went after the one boat in front of us.
Well I guess it wasn’t meant to be, I left the tack clutch open and we had to try to fix it. Dan had to crawl out to the bow and we slowed so he wouldn’t be washed off. Dan luckily got the pole back in place with the tack. Again we dropped positions and were now looking at working through the pack. We saw the other F25C with the sail down and it looked as their day was over. We continued to push and rounded in 3rd.
The last downwind we set the kite and immediately saw there was an issue. The tack was wrapped in the sheet and we had to take a little time to straighten it out. We had a nice long run down and jibed. Now we saw the tack was fouled on the port run also. We turned back and manually held the tack while the fouled line was cleared. We caught some nice wind and made it to the bottom mark for the last time. We got a puff and were hot coming into the mark but the takedown went well. We were now the lead boat and we turned for the finish.
The upwind was one long tack. We were trying to put distance on the boats we had to give time to. We managed to get almost to the committee boat but saw we were going to have to tack. We tacked and crossed the line then set our watches. As first to finish we were all about how much time do we owe them? How many miles did we sail, how much time per mile do we owe? We turned down and sailed toward the opening of the Alameda channel. Watching the other boats finish we knew we had dropped to third.
It was a good day on the water, even with all the mistakes and issues. Sorry it didn’t turn out better.