Kotuku is heading south this weekend for Winter Vashon. Only 7 aboard as a couple of us are begging off for Janna's 40th Birthday party. Go Kotuku, Go, Go Kotuku say Savai and Talia. Email Al if you want a ride, as he has room for a couple more!
Also, more RTC photos here: Lee Youngblood Photos
Monday, November 28, 2011
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Great Photos from Round The County
https://picasaweb.google.com/100094681587997126638/111112RoundTheCounty
Great work by Sean Trew, who does some seriously good photography!
Great work by Sean Trew, who does some seriously good photography!
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Ben's RTC Article on Pressure Drop
A nice photo series/write-up here
Results are here
Apparently 6 boats broke the all-time course record this year, with Braveheart setting the fastest ever elapsed time. Well done!
Monday, November 14, 2011
Another Kotuku kind of weekend...with a little help from Al. Again.
Round The County is my favorite weekend of racing of the year. I love the fact we get to race around spectacular islands, party with interesting people, and race against great competition. for two days straight. It doesn't hurt that we have a wizard aboard with a penchant for finding acorns just when we need them, either.
If you don't get the reference, let me just refresh your memory. Last year Al's "even a blind squirrel finds a nut" call that sent us through the Peapods and out into our own personal wind, allowing us to finish at the top of our fleet despite the fluky conditions was something he thought was a once in a lifetime sort of thing. Except he managed to find a couple of walnuts this year.
The first was at Turn Point. After blasting north from the start, with good boat speed (we thought) we rounded Patos and headed down Boundary Pass in good position, with the usual suspects close around us (Karma, Vitesse, Bravo Zulu, etc). We thought this looks just fine. Until we noticed Zulu, up ahead at turn point--couldn't even see her but she had her AIS on. It turns out she rounded Patos 7 minutes in front of us.
Guess this might have lit a fire under Al, because we got to Turn Point and instead of rounding wide to stay out in the wind, we tacked in. Right into sloppy, confused water, rips, and shifty wind. But the tide and the shift paid huge. Not sure, but it looked like we made up about 5 minutes right there. The beat to the finish also favored us, and we ground back another minute, finishing exactly one minute behind them and correcting over them by two minutes. So much for day one--except for the football in the bar, the fantastic salmon burgers, the toasty warm barge, and the fact that I got to sleep with 7 of my closest friends. (Close being the operative word with 8 guys on a small boat)
Day two started with a bang. And three collisions, two over earlys and a lot of swearing at the race officials. We didn't have our best start either. Al nearly uttered profanity himself. I heard at least one loud "Sheesh," which in Al-speak means we have just committed some heinous act of boat handling, judgement, or both. But we didn't hit anyone or anything, didn't run aground, and came out OK because nearly everyone else had a worse start than we did.
The breeze was up on the outside, and we had a great kite reach-jib reach-kite run down to Salmon Bank and on around Lopez. Lots of trimming, grinding, dumping of the main, and hard work to keep the boat on her feet and rolling. Fine job of crew work--these are guys who perform well when the wind is honking.
Meanwhile, our friends on Zulu went wide outside and we stayed close to Cattle Pass (lumpy). Going the right way even though it was hard work was enough to neutralize their obvious speed advantage, but they came in quickly and in no time were to weather power reaching away from us. Meanwhile Karma had apparently attached a tow rope to our transom, and was proceeding to drop into big waves behind us and surf up to our beam. We all know how much I love a dogfight, but Al was having none of it and forced me repeatedly to leave them alone. In fact he appears to have learned his lesson about watching me closely, because every time I would try to creep up he would say "no, not that notch, the one way over there", or "no higher than that hump" or some other very large, unmistakable landmark very far away from where the competition was going. As the breeze lightened he seemed to want me to sail lower and slower to boot.
But Al was right. the other boats sailed one after another into the lee of Blakely. Meanwhile we separated. And when they were shifting to jibs and beating slowly to the finish, we were power reaching outside with the A3, being lifted up to the finish. For the second year in a row, we would save enough time to finish ahead of faster boats and force the crew of Kotuku to go looking for that big silver cup with our our name on it. It should have Al's name on it by now, don't you think?
A big thank you to Al, Chris, Brian, Matt, Eli, Kenyon and Somerset who sailed almost flawlessly. It wasn't an easy weekend but you were fast, consistent, and fun to sail with. Honorable crew mention to Janna, Talia, and Savai who have put up with me being gone for 22 of the last 25 days. Thanks for the support!
If you don't get the reference, let me just refresh your memory. Last year Al's "even a blind squirrel finds a nut" call that sent us through the Peapods and out into our own personal wind, allowing us to finish at the top of our fleet despite the fluky conditions was something he thought was a once in a lifetime sort of thing. Except he managed to find a couple of walnuts this year.
The first was at Turn Point. After blasting north from the start, with good boat speed (we thought) we rounded Patos and headed down Boundary Pass in good position, with the usual suspects close around us (Karma, Vitesse, Bravo Zulu, etc). We thought this looks just fine. Until we noticed Zulu, up ahead at turn point--couldn't even see her but she had her AIS on. It turns out she rounded Patos 7 minutes in front of us.
Guess this might have lit a fire under Al, because we got to Turn Point and instead of rounding wide to stay out in the wind, we tacked in. Right into sloppy, confused water, rips, and shifty wind. But the tide and the shift paid huge. Not sure, but it looked like we made up about 5 minutes right there. The beat to the finish also favored us, and we ground back another minute, finishing exactly one minute behind them and correcting over them by two minutes. So much for day one--except for the football in the bar, the fantastic salmon burgers, the toasty warm barge, and the fact that I got to sleep with 7 of my closest friends. (Close being the operative word with 8 guys on a small boat)
Day two started with a bang. And three collisions, two over earlys and a lot of swearing at the race officials. We didn't have our best start either. Al nearly uttered profanity himself. I heard at least one loud "Sheesh," which in Al-speak means we have just committed some heinous act of boat handling, judgement, or both. But we didn't hit anyone or anything, didn't run aground, and came out OK because nearly everyone else had a worse start than we did.
The breeze was up on the outside, and we had a great kite reach-jib reach-kite run down to Salmon Bank and on around Lopez. Lots of trimming, grinding, dumping of the main, and hard work to keep the boat on her feet and rolling. Fine job of crew work--these are guys who perform well when the wind is honking.
Meanwhile, our friends on Zulu went wide outside and we stayed close to Cattle Pass (lumpy). Going the right way even though it was hard work was enough to neutralize their obvious speed advantage, but they came in quickly and in no time were to weather power reaching away from us. Meanwhile Karma had apparently attached a tow rope to our transom, and was proceeding to drop into big waves behind us and surf up to our beam. We all know how much I love a dogfight, but Al was having none of it and forced me repeatedly to leave them alone. In fact he appears to have learned his lesson about watching me closely, because every time I would try to creep up he would say "no, not that notch, the one way over there", or "no higher than that hump" or some other very large, unmistakable landmark very far away from where the competition was going. As the breeze lightened he seemed to want me to sail lower and slower to boot.
But Al was right. the other boats sailed one after another into the lee of Blakely. Meanwhile we separated. And when they were shifting to jibs and beating slowly to the finish, we were power reaching outside with the A3, being lifted up to the finish. For the second year in a row, we would save enough time to finish ahead of faster boats and force the crew of Kotuku to go looking for that big silver cup with our our name on it. It should have Al's name on it by now, don't you think?
A big thank you to Al, Chris, Brian, Matt, Eli, Kenyon and Somerset who sailed almost flawlessly. It wasn't an easy weekend but you were fast, consistent, and fun to sail with. Honorable crew mention to Janna, Talia, and Savai who have put up with me being gone for 22 of the last 25 days. Thanks for the support!
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