Wednesday 30th July 2014 & Sunday 3rd August 2014

"Wednesday 30th July 2014 & Sunday 3rd August 2014 "

I am going to forget Wednesday , it was a disaster . It started off breezy but the wind soon dropped . I can't put my finger on it but we seemed to be going backwards . Maybe I had too much rig tension ? Who knows?

 Anyway Sunday was a cracker . The first windy day in ages and a reminder that sailing is excellent exercise as well as a competitive day out   . We sailed 3 races and I was totally shattered (in a good way)  at the end . We had some good battles with Graham but  he always got the better us . Our best chance to beat him was the first race . He rounded the last mark in-front and we tacked off immediately . When we crossed again we had gained significantly and seemed to be going faster . However a Merlin Rocket caught us on Starboard , we didn't see it till late and completely messed up the tack losing any advantage we had and ended up sailing  for the wrong end of the line . In the other two races we swapped positions during the race but Graham always came out on top . Grrrrr. Plenty of gybes and plenty of spinnaker practice !!

Sunday 27th July 2014

"Sunday 27th July 2014"

I have been away for a few weeks and the winds have been like this picture , but today we had some breeze . I didn't have a crew for the first race but John an old sea dog had capsized in the first race and was press- ganged into crewing for me . Together we engineered the perfect start ! Starting is difficult and extremely important , it is very rare you get a perfect line and as a rule one end is favorable. This means a lot of competition for one spot . A beginner should just try to be on time on Starboard (fairly easy ) be moving when the gun goes (reasonably easy) and have clear wind (not too easy ) . Forget getting the best position for now , you won't get it ,and will end up head to wind, missing the mark or even worse ramming the committee boat . Anyway after trying out both ends of the line we plumped for the outer buoy . 30 seconds to go the other boats were going for the committee boat end . We started on Port (risky) at the opposite end and managed to cross in front of the fast approaching Starboard boats putting us in the lead . We rounded the first mark in 2nd place but slipped back as the race progressed . Nevertheless are start proved a talking point and we had a great sail in breezy conditions .