Well unfortunately mother nature had other plans for Sunday, she let the fleet start, but then provided not enough wind for the fleet to finish, and with a strong tide it would have been impossible for the fleet to finish at Hobby! The race was abandoned!  Race Report from Nona Looking out from the Club porch, and it is fairly bucketing down. That’s one decision made. Leave the big spinnaker in the car where it is nice and dry. Today the crew is John and David. Bronwyn has called in a sick pass because of “dicey” venison. We motor out to the boat and set up with a full rig as there is not much wind at Hobby or further up the course. There is a nice long start line, care of Nona, and we mill around with everyone else. The tide and light winds are making the timing of the start tricky. We head for the line and cross about the same time as Firsty (we were behind by a foot). Heading towards Kauri Point the wind is behind so we hoist the number two spinnaker and try to interrupt Escapes wind. We need a bigger kite! The wind is ranging between 2.4 and 10 knots. Get around Kauri Pt and its port around Meola as well as the CCYC boats. Head up to Chelsea and drop the kite early, around and it is hard on the wind??? Up to Meola. Around Meola and back to Chelsea and the wind is decidedly dodgy. We are still trailing behind Firsty and Escape. We struggle around Chelsea and then park up by Watchman’s Island for some time. We hear the CCYC start boat advising their fleet ahead of us, of a shortened course which doesn’t bode well for our fleet to finish in any timely fashion. Soon after we get the call – Race abandoned. At this point the sun is shining, the temperature is warming as there is no wind and we are looking at the same scenery. Good call. Time to pack up and head home. At least the sails got an airing and are dry. Thanks to the start tower crew and the Social committee for the food. A reminder that there will be a Free lift and clean voucher care of the Floating Dock, up for the competitors on Open Day , Saturday 03 October. Flags down at 11.00. Nona Race report for Eye Spy: The weather forecast was for 20-30 knt winds and rain…….not the most attractive for an afternoon sailing. On the way to the clubrooms I drove through heavy hail which was not predicted so, what else are we in for? JK was my only crew today. Gill , Mark and Greg were otherwise occupied so we headed out to Eye Spy with the intention to leave the kites tucked away below as two handed gets a little tricky when the wind is up. When the showers cleared the wind dropped out to nothing meaning we may not get a start at all. The start sequence finally began and we positioned ourselves as best we could using my analogue watch and away we went. Soon after the start we were left behind as the other three hoisted kites. Firsty then Escape then Nona. JK and I sat back and drifted on behind wishing we had a few more hands on deck. The wind picked up a little on the way to Kauri Point suiting our two sail configuration and Eye Spy launched up to 7.2 knts……..momentarily. Catch up time……….then the wind dropped back to nothing and the kites of the lead three were struggling to fill. The course was to Meola. Down to Chelsea, back to Meola, back to Chelsea then home. The highlights of the race were avoiding collisions with the CCYC fleet at Meola and making up ground on the lead boats on the first leg up wind. Twas a lovely afternoon drifting around in next to no breeze so when the call to abandon race came we were a little disappointed. It is a difficult thing to abandon a race when so much of the course is behind you but, it was the right thing to do. Well done Nigel. Eye Spy did not leave empty handed as we won the lucky draw for a hull clean at Sharpies. Cleaned hull for the opening day of the summer series……….yeah. Thanks to Denise for allowing the prize to be redrawn. Many thanks to the other competitors of the winter series. Lets hope for more entries over summer. |
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