Even though the NWS was for 10-20 the central bay delivered a solid 15-25 with mostly flat water. Ideal and welcomed conditions after weeks of sailing in light air.
The RC sent us on the long course which had us going from the start/finish line in the Berkeley Circle, up to Harding, down to 21 and 8, back up to Harding and finally back to the finish. A little over 12 miles of racing.
Saturday we had our regular crew, with Rob and Andrew. We got off to a great start and chose the left side of the course. There was still a lingering flood but it wasn't very strong and I didn't want to play chicken with the lee of Angel. On a stronger flood we would have gone right, but in this case we chose left. The fleet quickly split between the lefties and the righties until we were the only ones left on the left side. We still had some good company with the Express 37 fleet behind us heading towards the cone in Alcatraz and quickly catching up to us. But we flinched and decided to go back and stay in some contact with our fleet. Not sure this paid off. I think had we gone a little farther and gotten into the cone it would have been an even shot, but tacking early left us exposed on the remaining flood. The Mumm which had been pretty even with us until we split rounding Harding a 100 yds or so ahead of us, with the 1D35 already past Alcatraz on their way to 21 by the time we rounded. So we will be in catch up mode. But we now had the breeze. With the kite up we were holding 14 and 15 knots and quickly catching up and passing the boats ahead. We caught up to the Mumm 30 near Alcatraz and had passed Ohana and Mintaka before we reached 21. To us it looked like the 1D35 went quite a bit past the gybe mark, as they were pretty far down. The reach from 21 to 8 was fully powered up with our A2 and we were flying with spray all over the boat. The 1D35 had a problem with their douse and had gone way past the mark. We couldn't believe we were now leading the fleet.
For the second upwind the wind was now above 20 knots and we played a more conservative leg. I took a couple of quick tacks to get in a strong covering position with the fleet and with the exception of Ohana, which has 15 more feet of waterline than us, we were able to keep the rest of the fleet behind us. Though both Mintaka and the 1D35 were right on our stern when we rounded.
It wasn't our cleanest set. We were powered up during the rounding and almost put the kite on the water. But strong crew work avoided a disaster. And we were off. With the winds now in the 20s gusting higher we were in full flight mode. Perfect crew work and sail handling, as I can only drive the boat if the sails are worked right. We were now consistently holding 15 - 16 knots, getting spurts into the 19s and hitting a top speed of 22 knots. It was an adrenaline ride. Still amazes me how well the boat handles in those conditions, with immediate acceleration on every puff. We had some good gybe angles, we caught up to Ohana around Pt Blunt and screamed towards the finish line to get the gun.
Results are yet up, so not sure how we finished on corrected, but we had a blast. The adrenaline was still pumping all the way down to the Bay Bridge on our way back home to Alameda. It was one fun ride. Rob took tons of video, so check back for an update once he gets to do some editing.
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