We motored to Corinthian from Alameda along side 'Sirius' on Friday evening. My crew lives in Sausalito so I figure I cut him a break this time and pick him up. We were joined later that night by 'Outsider'. Corinthian was having the first of its Friday night so we enjoyed some live Reggae music and a nice BBQ on the deck. That should have been enough entertainment for the night, but instead we decided to see what was going on at Sam's. Not a good move. Needless to say the early sun wasn't welcomed the next morning. But after a little breakfast in town we got to the business of getting our boats ready for the race.
My crew showed up with some great sandwiches and we sailed out to the course. As the second to last start it was clear what the desired strategy was for the start, be first on the pin with clear air without barging in and getting forced out. By the time of our start the current was pushing in quite a bit and we had a mediocre start, close enough to the pin but with quite a few boats windward of us affecting our wind. Had to foot out a bit to get out of the lee of the 1D35. We did ok in the lighter conditions. Initially we were laying the mark with the Flying Tiger slightly ahead and leeward of us. For a while we started wondering if the fleet in front of us knew what the course was, as everyone seemed to be headed out towards the gate. But we quickly found out when the shift hit us and we entered the 'real' current.
We crossed back to the lighter current and started headed towards yellow bluff waiting for the wind to fill from the west to help us make our way across the bay. We didn't come anywhere near close to Little Harding, we were at least a half mile west of it. We started reaching across the bay, and after seeing 'Stink Eye' hold his kite, we raised ours towards Blossom.
We had a nice run to Blossom, We were in the front end of the fleet but we did loose some time by taking our expedition to the gate. We rounded behind Uno and could see a few boats ahead of us, Outsider and Twist being some of them. The upwind leg had the perfect conditions for my new boat, we were screaming upwind. Had a few issues with my main halyard slipping in the clutch (we jury rigged it to a cam cleat and had that fixed). Other than that we did the traditional short tacking off the city front to stay out of the worse of the flood. We picked a few boats along the way and as we rounded Blackaller we could see to front of the fleet, with Timberwolf, Twist and the J90 leading the monohull fleet. We quickly set the kite and took off.
Timberwolf was in front of us and we started to shorten the gap. We had to continuously jibe to startboard tack as the wind on the north side was getting light. We gave Pt. Blunt a wide berth and started heading to SH on a lightening breeze. We could see the big catamaran and a tri struggling to get around the shoals. To our surprise the three boats ahead of us tacked around SW to go around the south side to AI. My crew and I had discussed our strategy and we were 90% committed to going through Raccoon. A quick look at the heading of the boats that turned south reaffirmed that decision, even though it was looking mighty light towards Tiburon. We managed to have enough breeze to ghost to the entrance of the straits, but then we stopped. A couple of times we started drifting backwards, and we even set the kite momentarily going west on the straits. The fight paid off and we were back on the westerly. A quick look back and to our surprise Outsider was 100 yds behind us. We hadn't seen any other boats other than Twist make the rounding. Now we had another boat to race. We had a screaming reach to Little Harding, followed by another screaming reach back to the finish. Just before rounding LH we saw the big cat rounding from the east. So it looked like out of the leading boats that went around the south side of AI only the cat was ahead of us. A couple of stressful moments dealing with the hole and shifts around the finish and we soon crossed the line. The gun had a misfire so we didn't get a gun, but we did get a nice apology from the RC. Good day for JetStream.
We stopped by the club in time to see the main fleet finish from the race deck. I tell you, it looked worse than a TBF finish with multiple boats on top of each other finishing seconds apart. We left the race deck to not get in the way and enjoyed a cold beer. Thanks to the Race Committee for a hard days work.
I waited for Sirius to finish and headed back to Alameda....
My crew showed up with some great sandwiches and we sailed out to the course. As the second to last start it was clear what the desired strategy was for the start, be first on the pin with clear air without barging in and getting forced out. By the time of our start the current was pushing in quite a bit and we had a mediocre start, close enough to the pin but with quite a few boats windward of us affecting our wind. Had to foot out a bit to get out of the lee of the 1D35. We did ok in the lighter conditions. Initially we were laying the mark with the Flying Tiger slightly ahead and leeward of us. For a while we started wondering if the fleet in front of us knew what the course was, as everyone seemed to be headed out towards the gate. But we quickly found out when the shift hit us and we entered the 'real' current.
We crossed back to the lighter current and started headed towards yellow bluff waiting for the wind to fill from the west to help us make our way across the bay. We didn't come anywhere near close to Little Harding, we were at least a half mile west of it. We started reaching across the bay, and after seeing 'Stink Eye' hold his kite, we raised ours towards Blossom.
We had a nice run to Blossom, We were in the front end of the fleet but we did loose some time by taking our expedition to the gate. We rounded behind Uno and could see a few boats ahead of us, Outsider and Twist being some of them. The upwind leg had the perfect conditions for my new boat, we were screaming upwind. Had a few issues with my main halyard slipping in the clutch (we jury rigged it to a cam cleat and had that fixed). Other than that we did the traditional short tacking off the city front to stay out of the worse of the flood. We picked a few boats along the way and as we rounded Blackaller we could see to front of the fleet, with Timberwolf, Twist and the J90 leading the monohull fleet. We quickly set the kite and took off.
Timberwolf was in front of us and we started to shorten the gap. We had to continuously jibe to startboard tack as the wind on the north side was getting light. We gave Pt. Blunt a wide berth and started heading to SH on a lightening breeze. We could see the big catamaran and a tri struggling to get around the shoals. To our surprise the three boats ahead of us tacked around SW to go around the south side to AI. My crew and I had discussed our strategy and we were 90% committed to going through Raccoon. A quick look at the heading of the boats that turned south reaffirmed that decision, even though it was looking mighty light towards Tiburon. We managed to have enough breeze to ghost to the entrance of the straits, but then we stopped. A couple of times we started drifting backwards, and we even set the kite momentarily going west on the straits. The fight paid off and we were back on the westerly. A quick look back and to our surprise Outsider was 100 yds behind us. We hadn't seen any other boats other than Twist make the rounding. Now we had another boat to race. We had a screaming reach to Little Harding, followed by another screaming reach back to the finish. Just before rounding LH we saw the big cat rounding from the east. So it looked like out of the leading boats that went around the south side of AI only the cat was ahead of us. A couple of stressful moments dealing with the hole and shifts around the finish and we soon crossed the line. The gun had a misfire so we didn't get a gun, but we did get a nice apology from the RC. Good day for JetStream.
We stopped by the club in time to see the main fleet finish from the race deck. I tell you, it looked worse than a TBF finish with multiple boats on top of each other finishing seconds apart. We left the race deck to not get in the way and enjoyed a cold beer. Thanks to the Race Committee for a hard days work.
I waited for Sirius to finish and headed back to Alameda....
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