Wednesday evening race #18

North Westerly winds at 3-8 knots. Race course was 2 X 1 X

Includes exciting footage of how NOT to round the windward mark…!!

Solid start, got very close to Hallel, debatable whether we got too close? I shall consult with Peter Blacklock…See video:

Got to the windward mark in third – see rounding:

Parade fetch down to X, but stayed ahead of Ricochet just behind us and managed to pick off Addicted, rounded in second behind Desperado; Nice rounding see video:

As has happened many times in the last few races this is where the string starts to unravel somewhat. Whether it is the pressure of over boats catching up to us…over thinking the tactics?? Instead of sailing our own race we got ourselves into a situation where we were pushed out to the port layline by Ricochet. In hind sight we probably should have kept sailing longer on port under Desperado, until Desperado tacked or Ricochet tacked behind us. I then made a HUGE mistake, probably described as “dumb move of the season”, at the windward mark as will be evident on the video.

Lots of screaming about rights from Ricochet – actually we had rights up to the point where we probably would have fouled Ricochet under rule 18.3(a). Presumably Ricochet is very familiar with this rule (as we all should be) since they fouled us in this same scenario earlier in the season when we had John Vanzee on board who politely asked them if they realized they rounded illegally?

18.3 Tacking in the Zone

(a) shall not cause the other boat to sail above close-hauled to avoid contact or prevent the other boat from passing the mark on the required side

See the video:

The look on Scotty Millers face…!! He’s thinking WTF is Trevor doing?