We had a great race...
Wednesday, I arrived at White Plains airport in driving rain planning to race at the Norwalk Yacht Club that evening. When we arrived at the club only to be told that the racing that evening was canceled due to weather (I guess a storm was coming in). We went to the boat and decided to go for a quick sail with the main sail only.
Thursday: We met with the Quantum sail-maker who helped us tune the rig. (the boat's only been in the water for a couple of weeks). A couple of turns there, a couple here and it's tuned. We decided to keep the roller furl up since we were competing in the double-handed class (only 2 of us for 200 miles). In the evening we reviewed the scratch sheet only to find several off-shore killers in the fleet including 4 J120's and a J35 with a gift rating (who knew?).
Friday: Race Day...We spend the entire day getting boat ready after being over-served in town the night before. It wouldn't be a great off-shore experience without tying one on the night before, this was our first double-handed, I think I'll take it a bit easier next time.
The boat (Red Sky): I have to say (even more so after the race) that I love the 36.7. The boat is perfectly balanced at the helm and I even like the fact that it has a wheel for such a small platform. It's got a big main and we got around perfectly with the 145 vs. the 155 Genoa, hardly ever feeling overpowered. Downhill the boat is a pig. Whoever calculated the polars was lying off their ass, we were never able to get the boat dialed in downwind. Upwind the boat rocks. With the hammer down the boat speed goes unmatched. What was even more impressive was that poking her into the wind didn't burn off speed all the way up to 30deg true in 10kts breeze.
The Start: We were lucky to have the first start of the day at 5:00pm EST, with the final start the Maxi's and Grand Prix classes starting over an hour later. After a bad start we worked our way high on the course and passed several boats including Paladin, the J35 we never seemed to shake for over a day.
Day 1: Needless to say, there is always weather on The Sound and it didn't miss us. During our first meal, we suffered a knock-down. We were reaching and got a gust of over 35kts that firmly planted our rail in the water. I didn't realize how tough it would be to correct the problem with 2 people on board, but we got through it...and managed to turn the boat around and get moving in the right direction.
1st Night: The neither of us slept. We had rain, wind, no wind and low temps. Nothing new. We got 'ghosted' by one of the big boys late in the night.
Day 2: Early morning brought us to "The Race" it's where the Sound dumps into the Atlantic (if you time it right). We were lucky to get there during the Ebb which gave us a decent 3+knt current on the way out. Unfortunately we were going downhill (she's a pig). It was my first time leaving the sound and going into the Atlantic. The line is not easy to describe. Where the sound is calm, the transition to 4ft boiling seas (for a short period of time) is like moving from a pool into a hot tub.
Block Island: Scenic, great wind, rounding the can was fun since we had to do a 2 handed douse and turn in traffic ( 5 of us came together at that point). We probably should have cut the corner on the south side of the Island, but none of the bigger boat in front of us made that move. We assumed there was some local knowledge there so we followed the train about 2 miles out before making our turn back toward "The Race". Needless to say, we saw a boat take the shortcut and make some significant gains...damn.
Last Night: This is where we cleaned up. We drifted for about 2 hrs with 2 other boat (the J35 being one of them) to the point of even going backwards in current and doing a 360. When the wind picked up we took off, picking off boats in front of us. With a westerly wind we were behind our competition while heading toward the north shore. Our competition tacked back south while we dug even further north. When we finally decided to tack, we captured a shift NW that bent us directly toward Stamford Harbor. We never tacked again until we got to the finishing turn. Our competition had to tack back after going south on a major shift in the wrong direction.
The Outcome: We finished 2nd in class and 17th overall and are very happy with ourselves. It was Adam's 3rd time sailing his new boat and my first time on a 36.7. I love Off-shore racing!
WTF???
