Mille Wins!

This past Saturday we raced in the Start Your Heart Out series of races hosted by Shoreline Yacht Club. This was the first in the summer sailing season for our group. Thanks to the crew of Lesley MacDonald, Liz Roberts, Dave Lyon, Victoria Hodge, Nick, Jim Merk (arrived late – more on that below) and my darling co-captain Risa Scott, we won our class.

This series of five short races (average about 25 minutes each) were designed to give all of us practice at the all important start for a race. The course was a .75 mile windward/leeward course. As is the case in racing, each start presented a unique set of challenges, some of which we handled well, some not so well. It was a great set of races to get some needed practice at nailing the start. We won four of the five races and as noted above, won our class.

The start of the first race was dominated by light winds as is often the case in Long Beach earlier in the day. At one point I wasn’t sure we would even get to the start line but we did for what was the closest and best start we had all day. We came into the start line on starboard tack but had a boat below us which came very close to pushing us over the line early. As it was, we were not over early and after a couple of tacks were the first boat around the mark. When we were going upwind the light winds weren’t noticed as much but how light they were became very apparent as we headed to the finish line down wind.

The June Gloom started to clear and the winds started to pick up a bit for the start of the second race. We didn’t get quite as good a start for the second race, crossing the line second but made up for it with a great first leg upwind to the mark. We were again first around the mark for our class, although we were behind a couple of the boats in the class ahead of us. We also had a good time dodging the Cal 20’s that were having their own one-design regatta. As the wind was picking up the race committee decided to run a slightly longer course by adding another mark rounding and a short upwind leg to the finish. Unless you are flying a spinnaker sailing downwind is just not as much fun as being close hauled on an upwind leg.

Apparently we decided subconsciously to make all of our mistakes for the day in one race and the third race of the day was that race! We had our worst start of the day crossing the line in last place for our class. We had a good upwind leg driven primarily by the new light #1 jib that we added to Mille’s sail inventory just a month or so ago. North Sails of Long Beach did a great job of designing and making the sail – thanks to them for their work. We decided that since the object of this race series was practice, we decided to practice using the spinnaker. Our launch after the rounding of the first mark was late due to the foredeck crew (yours truly) not being ready. After a short run with the chute up we needed to gybe to make the next mark but after noticing a tear in the spinnaker from strapping it against the bowrail, we decided to douse it and finish the race with the jib. Due to all of the time lost to trying to get the chute up and flying, we finished last in our class for this race.

We got a better start for the fourth race, crossing the line second in our class as we did in the second race. After another good upwind leg to the first mark, we rounded it in first place in our class. Mille really does like to be close hauled and charging hard. As we had retired the damaged spinnaker and our injured pride, we made the boring but uneventful (mostly) run to the second mark. The highlight of this leg was the appearance of Jim Merk by jet-ski to join us. Much to his chagrin, Jim had gotten called into work Saturday morning to fix some issues for two of the executives who were headed out of the country the next day. He got the work finished in time to join us during the fourth race. It is not every race that you take on additional crew from a jet-ski during the race. We made the upwind sprint on the third leg for our third victory of the day.

The fifth and final race was almost a repeat of the fourth except we now had additional crew on board but with the same result – another victory.

Many thanks to the Race Management Committee of Shoreline Yacht Club, chaired by Steve Anderson for this unique and interesting series of races.

Next race is the fourth in the Long Beach Harbor Invitational series hosted by Little Ships Fleet Yacht Club on Saturday, June 12th. The following day (Sunday, June 13th) we start the Summer Series hosted by Shoreline Yacht Club.