The race report from Al. (It was Talia's 6th birthday party, so I was unavailable. But the drama and challenge of the race is all here, without the rain.) Well done, team Kotuku!
The day started with rain, cold and 15 knot northerly at Shilshole. On the drive down to Gig Harbor we could see it would probably be quite a variable day as by the time we got down to the boat it was still rainy and cold but now the wind was light out of the south which confirmed the forecast of southerlies in the south sound and northerlies north of Seattle.
When our class started it was blowing 8-10 out of the south with shifts to both the east and west. Playing the middle of Colvos most of the way north under 1/2 oz. runner we hung with Flim Flam and Absolutely leading the way. The rain started letting up by 1100. Towards the north end of Colvos we ran into the first big shift to an easterly, we changed to the A3 and closed on some of competition and even started seeing some sun here and there.
At Blake we peeled to the russian for the short run down to the turning mark and a quick change to the heavy 1. Nice douse and rounding, with a few quick tacks to clear Blake and settled down for a long port tack run down Colvos. West of center worked well for us passing Flim Flam and closing on Absolutely, until about 1/3 of the way down the wind started dying. Shifted to the light 1 and carried on for a while until the wind died completely. It was weird looking at the windex pointing one way and to sails filling another. It was apparent there was lots of wind shear with some air at the surface going one way and air up top going the other. S
hortly we felt the first breaths of a northerly, up with the finger and we carried on. Reaching pretty hard back and forth chasing the wind patches, we missed the action close along the Vashon shore where the B25 made some huge gains. Jibing back and forth we missed a couple of shifts here as well. The northerly then gave way to a quickly building southerly and the first boats to get into that stretched out some. The southerly had some shifts and fighting the building ebb while staying out of the wind holes along the shoreline made for some interesting sailing. We had a mini fight with Darby on the last stretch. They were the instigators by tacking on us but we fought our way through and then laid a couple of tacks on them before finally getting to the finish line. Current was ripping at the finish line of almost 2 knots against us.
Pretty sure we ended up second again to Absolutely. We went in and dropped most of the crew at the town dock. Matt and I had a nice ride home on the boat motoring along at near wind speed, saw some fireworks from the Clink (go Sounders!), before hitting the northerly in Elliott Bay, brrrr. More wind shear evidence the smoke from the fireworks was going north but we we motoring into a 10 knot northerly. All in all not a bad day's work, crew did well with new trimmers in the cockpit, with Alicia and Wes becoming almost old hands by time we were done. Matt got some more learning in to the main sail. Kenyon and Emily holding down their usual good jobs at mast and pit respectively. Alex did a masterful job keeping us in the right place with the right sails. Thanks to Graeme for letting us take Madame K out on the dance floor.
Photos are here: http://janpix.smugmug.com/Boats/GHYC-Islands-Race-2012/21986132_MFp8hs#!i=1753723719&k=mS8vbSF
Thanks to all of you for fighting the good fight in tough conditions. We finished the series second in our class--kudos to Absolutely, who beat us every race. Lest we feel sorry for ourselves, it looks like they finished 1st overall. And wonder of wonders, it looks like we finished 4th overall out of 86 boats. Persistence and consistency deliver for the team. Well done, people! I am seriously proud of our efforts. Thanks to everyone who participated in a great season of winter racing!
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