Earlier this year JetStream got denied entry to the Doublehanded Farallones even though it met all the objective criteria and equipment requirements for the race. For the Doublehanded Lightship we would need to get some waivers from the race committee for a couple of the items on the NCORC list that it used for its required equipment list. We requested the waivers from the committee and they were respectfully denied. Oh well, we wouldn't be allowed to participate on the race but we are free to go for a sail around the Lightship any time we want. My crew Rob and I already had our schedule open for this race so we decided to ghost the fleet as they raced.
The Lightship buoy stands about 11 miles Southwest the Golden Gate bridge. We had officially done this race two years ago in 2012 on JetStream without any problem, but this year with the 'new' rules and without any waivers the boat no longer qualified.
We had an early wakeup call Saturday morning. With a start scheduled for 9am off the Golden Gate YC, we would need to leave the dock in Alameda by 7. At least be boat was already in the water from our Friday night race. But it still took us three trips to the car to load up all the offshore gear and pretty much the full 1.5 hours delivery to the starting line to set it up and stow it. The list of equipment we don't keep onboard for our bay racing is quite extensive:
- offshore flares and Epirb Jug
- large dry bag with:
- sail repair kit
- radar reflector
- extra flashlight
- search light
- spare nav lights
- autopilot
- danbuoy
- offshore hatch
- jacklines, tethers
- 8' vhf mast/antenna
- full sail inventory, #3, #4, A2, A5, C0
- extra fuel
Rob found space for every piece in our shelves while keeping some of the key emergency items at easy reach.
The forecast had been quite promising all week. Early in the week it was showing 15 - 25 and by race day it had moderated a bit to 10 - 20 with higher gusts. During breakfast the lightship was already reporting 20 knots of breeze from the NW. This would make for a quick fetch once we cleared Pt. Bonita and hooked into the NWesterlies. With remaining ebb pushing us out at the start it would make for a very fast trip. On the way to the start we could already see a more Northerly direction on the breeze than usual. This would be great for the ocean but it meant NO wind inside the Bay.
Smartly, the RC did not postpone so that the fleet could still use the remaining ebb to get out of the Gate. Initially I was planning on starting just after our 'division' (of course we wouldn't cross the starting line to avoid confusing the RC), but since there was literally no wind, we didn't want to interfere with the guys racing and decided to stay a few hundred yards away from the starting line towards the center of the Bay. We were in a bit better current so we started to drift ahead of first fleet. Caught a few SW puffs that help us inch towards the Gate. It was all a little painful as we had just our #4 up, preparing for the smackdown we were expecting outside Bonita. But we stayed patient and drifted along taking advantage of whatever breeze we could find. Close to the gate we started getting a light but consistent Westerly breeze and we got on our upwind leg to Pt. Bonita.
We wanted to exit lands end on the North side. But at Bonita the wind backed down again. That made for some uncomfortable sailing. The seas, though not big, were pretty confused in the area and with all the bouncing around we couldn't keep much flow on the sails. We were back to less than 2 knots of boatspeed, bouncing around in the chop. But we knew the NW breeze was out there. So we tacked back to starboard to try to get it as quickly as possible. At Bonita, both Condor and Outsider were beginning to come up behind us. Condor pulled the plug and Outsider continued on port tack for a bit longer. Our tack payed off and little by little we started to get the expected lift and a few moments later the breeze began to fill in gradually. We were now on a very comfortable high teens fetching the mark.
We were sailing straight up the channel with the building breeze. The waves weren't particularly big and once we got in the channel they got more structured. We were now screaming at around 9 knots straight at the mark. We cleared the channel and had both the Lightship and the Pilot ship in sight. I was thinking that the sea state would mellow out in the deeper water but we came across a couple of steep sets. Between the steepness and our speed we had a couple of decent slams and with the Lightship about a mile away (another 10 minutes at the rate we were going) we decided we had enough distance to enjoy the downhill ride back and turned the boat around.
By now we were in the solid 20s and our decision to just put the #4 was rewarded. We soon jumped to the mid teens in boatspeed, with just the white sails up. With a couple of the surfs we would jump to 17-18 knots touch 20s a few times. The boat was effortless in this conditions. It still amazes me how well behaved the boat is. With the white sails up I could pretty much take the boat anywhere. We could come up hard for speed and to big bear aways to hook up to the swell and surf down. We set our A5 as we exited the channel and had a really fun ride back to Pt Bonita never really dropping below 13 knots. At this windspeed and angle the boat required very active trimming. With the big accelerations down the waves the apparent wind changes were pretty drastic. Inside Bonita the wind backed and dropped a bit, so we had a pretty mellow spinnaker run. We cleared the South Tower and headed towards Crissy. By 12:10 we were back inside Gate. A little over 3 hours to cover the 23 (for us) mile course.
It is certainly a physical boat in the upwind conditions, and rewardingly easy on the downwind portions. We learned a few things. For me, my offshore gear is just to bulky. It is fine for spending the night on the rail on a big boat or standing behind the wheel, but for the active sailing on the JS probably a bit lighter drysuit, or moving to an offshore smock would feel less restrictive. Also, need to streamline and better plan the offshore gear particular with our limited space.
Bottom line is that the boat performed very well under the normal Gulf conditions of 20+ knots and reasonable seas. For short duration, near shore races (like the Lightship, HMB and even Drakes) waivers should be granted so we could officially participate, and even some of the shorter downwind rides to Santa Cruz and Monterey would be very doable (if I had a road trailer to bring the boat back).
Thanks to Rob for his excitement and energy to take the boat for an offshore ride.
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